The Impulse project brings together works by young artists who challenge conventional perspectives on contemporary St. Petersburg art. Rather than defining a singular trajectory for emerging art—whether through formal or thematic unity—the project seeks to capture the relevance of the moment in its diversity.
In physics, an impulse is described through two parameters: amplitude and duration. The amplitude, or the difference between its starting point and peak, defines its strength, while duration refers to time. Drawing from these characteristics, the Impulse exhibition presents works by young artists from St. Petersburg, mapping trajectories through the tangled temporality of the present and affirming difference as its defining feature.
Striving to avoid curatorial subjectivity, the project showcases the pure artistic process, free from thematic or formal constraints. The only predetermined condition was the site where each work would be placed. The result is an exhibition composed entirely of installations, most of which were realized by the artists for the first time. By its nature, installation art is deeply rooted in the specificity of place and time, forming a polyphonic space of expression that, within the exhibition, becomes an “act of presenting the present”.
The installations, as multiplied spatial images, confront the viewer with their sometimes overwhelming materiality. The artists use this materiality in direct relation to time—whether personal time, geological time, epochal time, or technological time. Here, time is nonlinear—it accelerates and slows down, cuts through the works, crystallizes, erodes, and tries to catch up with the viewer.
Alyona Smolina, Evgeny and Daria Molodtsov, iBiom Box, Tata Gorian, Anna Prilutskaya, Natalia Balabanova, The Andreev Brothers, Katya Butorina, Katerina Veselovskaya, Philipp Guzeev, Anastasia Kolesnik, Valentina Makarova, Anna Martynenko, Lidia Rikker, Polina Orlova, VOPI (Kirill Mikhaylin, Evgeny Tantsurin, Anton Kvitchuk).
Co-curated by Veronika Nikiforova
Technical Director: Vyacheslav Shatrovoy
PR: Anna Tolstaya
Design: Veronika Nikiforova
Editing and Translation: Kristina Ots
The project was organized as part of the Sergey Kuryokhin Center for Contemporary Art's program to support young artists and independent curators, with the support of the Vladimir Smirnov and Konstantin Sorokin Foundation. The project took place as part of the Curatorial Forum.
