The Béton Centre for Visual Culture presents Sasha Gentzis' project "Flight to the Dream".
The revolution in the conquest of the skies is relatively recent, just over a century ago, when the legendary Wright Brothers' Flyer took to the air in 1903. The invention, modernisation and tremendous success of the aircraft had a fundamental impact on the development of modern society. The aircraft became a symbol of the epoch of modern history, where civilisation changed its development path from evolutionary to revolutionary, from natural to artificial, from mystical to rational.
The principles of how the world was perceived were fundamentally changed. The boundaries of foreseeable reality have expanded considerably compared to previous eras. As man became more mobile, he came into contact with representatives of many different cultures, which stimulated the exchange of knowledge and opinions. Observing the earth's landscape from previously unreachable heights, humankind saw pictures of the world that had previously been either hidden from view or looked fundamentally different from the ground. Looking up into the sky, people no longer saw it only through the eyes of Prince Andrei Bolkonsky, marvelling at the divine calm and silent infinity. Now they looked upward through the eyes of the heroes of Tyshler's paintings, who sought no longer to bow before the sky, but to control it. Aviators such as V. Chkalov, M. Gromov and others became the main heroes of popular culture. Sasha Gentsis' project "Flight to the Dream" aims not only to comprehend but also to express by means of art the enormous importance of aviation in the modern era of technological progress.
The exposition consists of 21 photo canvases (125x167cm), which will allow you to see the cockpits of historical aircrafts, which are inaccessible to the viewer, as well as to feel yourself at the wheel. The works, executed in large format with high image detail, allow us to go far beyond the simple copying of reality. Using the techniques of digital contemporary art, the author makes it possible to see the smallest details of aircrafts and recreates the feeling of flight. By combining images from the cockpits of legendary models with landscapes from his own archive, Gentzis has given old aeroplanes a chance to take to the skies once more.
Each aircraft has its own history and distinctive visual aesthetics. It has become possible not only to see, but also to capture previously hidden from the eyes of ordinary people the interiors of cockpits, the holy of holies of modern temples of aeronautics. The purity and clarity of the language of electronics and numbers spoken by these devices, which is not fully comprehensible to the ordinary viewer, is perceived by him as an abstract rhythm, as if he were hearing the measured sound of the words of an unfamiliar chant. It is here that one can fully experience how, when flying an aeroplane, one glorifies the laws of the exact sciences, which in turn are governed by the universe beyond anyone's control.
