EVA VAŇOVÁ

The Aesthetics of the Presence

Environment Studio

Participatory practice is a key concept in your work. What is your previous experience with participative approaches and what communities do you usually work with?
I have been engaged in participatory practice for about six years and have collaborated with various groups. Working with children became natural for me – childhood significantly shapes our later experiences, relationships, and how we approach ourselves, others, and our environment. I have worked with children from children’s homes, children with autism or hearing impairments, the Roma and Ukrainian communities in community and social centers, as well as special schools. I have also done participatory work with adults in Košice prison.

Your work consists of an installation featuring embroidered images and carved wooden blocks. How do these relate to the participatory aspect of your work?
My graduate work essentially reflects on my practice in participatory art, particularly my work with children from socially disadvantaged backgrounds. I have been trying to translate the live participatory process into a gallery setting without it becoming merely a form of documentation. That is why I address the principles of participation and the way they have influenced my own approach and visual language.
The work translates these principles into four fictional beings, each representing one aspect of the participatory process – physicality, translation of meaning, collective relationality, and the ethical awareness of boundaries. I materialized these beings as four types of wooden cubes.
Embroidered images then represent a more personal reflection on my participative projects. I primarily used felt, drawing, and embroidery thread which I perceive as layers of bodily memory, spontaneous emotional records, but
also as structures or boundaries that organize and limit space and experience. The installation explores how experiences, relationships, and emotions can turn into an image, an object, or a space that remains open to further interpretation and interaction.

Who is the ideal audience for your work? Do you think your methods can be useful to educators, for example?
I don’t think my work has a single ideal audience – quite the opposite. For some, the exhibition may be primarily a visual experience. A social worker might see it as a way to work with safe spaces and communication; an educator may see it as an alternative, dialogic, and more sensitive form of education; and an artist may see it as an opportunity for participatory work. A child can engage with the work naturally through play, touch, and manipulating the blocks. But it is important that I don’t view these methods as separate from art. Even though they touch on pedagogy or social work, they remain part of my artistic practice and my creative way of thinking.

photo: Polina Davydenko