REPEAT AFTER ME II
Open Group (Yuriy Biley, Pavlo Kovach, Anton Varga)
Exhibition: 20 Apr – 24 Nov 2024
Thu 18 Apr 11:00
The Venice Biennale - Polish Pavilion
Giardini di Castello
Venezia
+39-41-2728397
Repeat after Me II is a collective portrait of witnesses to the ongoing war in Ukraine, presented in the form of
an audiovisual video installation. The protagonists of the film at the Polish Pavilion are civilians with refugee
experience, speaking about the war through the sounds of weapons they recall, which they invite the
audience to repeat. The Open Group art collective and curator Marta Czyż have thus created a military
karaoke of the future, joining the public and war witnesses in dialogue.
Repeat after Me II is an installation by the Ukrainian Open Group collective, made up of two films. These videos
were created in 2022 and 2024. All the people they feature are refugees, speaking of their war experiences
through the sounds of weapons they recall, then encouraging the audience to follow their lead. The artists use
the karaoke format. Yet here the accompaniment is not hit songs, but shots, missiles, howling and explosions,
and the lyrics are descriptions of deadly weapons. This is the soundtrack of a war.