WASTELAND WANDERERS / NIGHT

"Wasteland Wanderers" dilogy is an attempt to examine the poetical relation between the artist and environment through exploration of contemporary post-graffiti practice. "WW/Night" is the first part of it.

Together with "Wasteland Wanderers/Day" (https://vimeo.com/287338838) this film focuses on the artworks made by more than 20 artists during independent urban art festival - "Black Circle" (August 2017). 8th edition of Black Circle was realized at the area of abandoned Soviet health resort in Western Ukraine.

The main aim of "WW/Night" is to introduce the specific approach used by post-graffiti community; their sentiment regarding abandoned architecture; precise work with the natural environment; consideration of architectural surroundings and transgressive side of creative act provoked by the darkness of the night. Graffiti, tagging, wall writings became the inherent part of every city, an inherent destructive part of it. This act of creativity is still considered as vandalism, transgressive behavior, crime. And the night, the shadow created by the city light is the best cover for it. This film demonstrates the similarity between nature and the artworks which were deliberately integrated into it. A duality which is native to both is based on the notion of destruction within the process of creation. Therefore, the borderline between creation and destruction became the main theme of the night part.

This part of dilogy is narrated. Basically, it is a compilation of the extracts from the essays written by the artists special for the project. The whole range of their writings varies from the very personal statements to quotes from Haruki Murakami or allusions to religious stories. Most artists here don't reveal their faces, they're working under nicknames, some of them don't sign the artworks on the walls. That's why narration was made by the third party. Simultaneously it is a voice of 20 artists yet no one in particular. It doesn't mean that each one of these 20 thinks this way, but talking "all at once" in a big group sometimes helps to stay uncovered.

Both parts of Wasteland Wanderers dilogy work separately as independent shorts. Although, together two films are telling the complete story from the moment of creation and the context of it until the possible accidental encounter of the artwork in the middle of abandoned terrain.

List of involved artists: Akey, Am-Am, Anton Varga, BGJA, CXCVIII, Don Forty, Eas, Fruits of the Lump, Kuba, Maniac, Mihail Melnichenko, Nazar Sladkovsky, Nick Viska, No Future, O.K., Orma, Raspazjan Jan, Seikon, Sewer, Serhii Radkevich (aka Teck), Serhii Torbinov (aka York), Simek, Stanislav Turina, SC Szyman, Tabu, Vave.

Soundtrack: "Nacarat" by Sciama (written by Michael Watters).

Voice-over:
Katie Zaffrann
Lonnie Marts