KYIV – VENICE: Sawangwongse Yangwe in dialogue with Bohdan Tomashevsky

Clay of Time

https://www.labiennale.org/en/art/2026/sawangwongse-yawnghwe

https://universes.art/en/venice-biennale/2026/in-minor-keys-tour-3/sawangwongse-yawnghwe

In the works of Sawangwongse Yawnghwe, clay becomes a material capable of holding history. Thousands of hand-sculpted figures do not monumentalise major political events but restore their human dimension, in which wars, forced migrations, and colonial violence are understood through the presence of the individual. History emerges not as a completed narrative but as an ongoing process that leaves its imprint on landscapes, bodies, and memory. The material acquires particular significance precisely through its fragility, allowing history to speak in a quiet voice.

A similar understanding of clay as a bearer of form and time defines Bogdan Tomashevsky’s project SENAT. The meditative process of sculpting becomes a way of entering into dialogue with time, while the figures of ancient senators, warriors, and philosophers appear not as historical reconstructions but as archetypes of human choice and responsibility. Here, too, clay preserves not only form but also the very gesture of creation, through which the past becomes an occasion for inner contemplation. Both artists turn to clay as a material of being, demonstrating that the deepest reflections on history arise not from monumentality but from the encounter between human beings, matter, and time.