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- Lost in freedom
AntiGonna
In her work AntiGonna takes a very personal outlook on the ongoing war in Ukraine and her own position in it. In Lost in Freedom she wanders naked i.e. completely vulnerable and stripped of social status on the ruins in Kyiv, Bucha, Irpyn, Hostomel and Borodyanka. Her tender body at times collapses into a hologram, as if splitting between her two personalities – a human being Oksana and an artist AntiGonna.
Hollowed out, devastated, unrooted she murmurs сurses and spells, or maybe it’s the delusion of a person who spent several days under rubble or groans from the other world. It doesn’t matter anymore God or Devil; someone has to come save us by whatever means necessary. However, her roaming and numbering might also be interpreted as an act of catharsis, the only way to break through and one day in the future make peace with the painful past. One day, not today.
Under the artistic name AntiGonna and production AntiGonStaff is Oksana Andreieva (b.1986, Vinnytsia, Ukraine). She is an independent filmmaker, artist, actress and producer. Her practice spans experimental documentary, video art, VR 360, theatrical performance, photography, and installation, exploring the themes of fear, violence, death, and magical rituals through new perspectives on sexuality. Based previously in Kyiv and Warsaw, since 2022 she has lived and worked in Paris.
In AntiGonna’s art, porn horrors form a genre that combines elements of porn and horror in such a way that they neutralize each other’s consumer appeal. The aesthetics and narrative resemble rituals meant to tame the terror of existence by giving it a prop-like form. These rituals attempt to domesticate the horror of life, while also exposing hidden mechanisms of survival. Her practice also investigates the processing of personal identity, the comprehension of various aspects of sexuality and gender identity — hence, AntiGonStaff’s artistic activity is inseparable from working with trauma.
AntiGonna’s projects generally verge on experimental cinematography, performance and theatrical production, and sometimes employ media installations and photography. The main themes in her practice include fear, sex, and death in the public imagination. Her work is autobiographical, yet her imagery remains strictly metaphorical and used as a tool of expression. In her view, prohibitions and taboos keep public consciousness under pressure, but what they require is not concealment or condemnation, but the opposite — open discussion, allowing each individual to confront their own “self.”
