Pleasant delusion | 2024
“Pleasant Delusion” is a portable museum of the collective memory of Soviet people who grew up on the cusp of time (in the final years of the Soviet Union), the centerpiece of which is the Diary of a cadet of one of the Moscow military schools. The installation was first presented at the collective exhibition “LIVED/PAINTED” at the Library of Book Graphics (St. Petersburg) in December 2024.
Exhibit Explication:
A Soviet army box with the title “Pleasant Delusion” painted in black on the lid; a tarpaulin-covered bottom that serves as a podium for a leather folder with its contents: the magazine “Ogonyok” (August 91), the “Memorial Prayer” performance program (“Lenkom” Theater, early 90s), the cover of the VHS videocassette “A.D.Sakharov. Testament” (91); artist’s book ‘Diary of Cadet’ (single copy, hand assembled), containing records of an anonymous cadet of one of the Moscow military schools of the period 1990-1992 and inserts of archival documents and magazine clippings of the period, photographs and various artifacts of the era of the early 90s.
On the inner part of the lid of the box there is a wood engraving with the description of the project, as well as a cassette audio player Walkmаn made in the 90s with original headphones and a cassette with a recording of the concert of the band “Kino” in “Olympiyskiy” hall in May 90. The player comes with a manual explaining how to rewind, turn on and listen to the tape.
Before viewing the Diary and the contents of the leather folder, the author of the installation invites the viewer to put on headphones, turn on the concert recording, and imagine himself in the shoes of a cadet who attended a similar concert by the band Kino in late 1989, which he writes about in his Diary. As well as about attending the performance “Memorial Prayer”; an evening dedicated to the memory of Academician Sakharov; a concert of Viktor Tretyakov, where he met Boris Yeltsin; as well as about many other things – but not about his studies at the military school. This is the diary of a young man who found himself on the cusp of time in a place where he felt like a stranger.
The idea of the project is to immerse the viewer in the context of the time in which the Diary was written, and to invite the viewer to engage with this time not only visually, but also audibly and tactilely.
