Elena Slobtseva is a visual multidisciplinary artist, working with installation, objects and animation/video. The themes that Slobtseva refers to are traumas of construction, destruction and reconstruction, the dialectics of breaking and repair. Her favourite material has been metal staples, which enable the artist to speak on the current political and social issues, as in Crimea, 2015, Replay, 2019 or Spiders, 2022, staying within the framework of minimalist abstraction.
BIO
Born in 1981 in Perm, Russia, Elena Slobtseva studied in Russia and USA for her Master’s degree in English Literature and Art. Gravitating towards minimalism and formal experimentation, Elena creates installations, objects, drawings, and animations, the protagonists of which are often office and construction staples of various sizes. The staple can act as a graphic element or a stroke, hold together disparate elements or roughly cut into surfaces. The themes that Slobtseva refers to are traumas of construction, destruction and reconstruction, binding, and separation. Selected group shows include Moscow International Biennale of Young Art (2014), the 1st Garage Triennial of Russian Contemporary Art, Moscow (2017), The 12th Time Zone — A Contemporary Art Report from Russia, Brussels (2019), Nemoskva is Just Around the Corner, St. Petersburg (2020). Nominee for the 2021 Innovation Prize as the “Artist of the Year” (2021) for her solo show Culture of Materials (2020). Worked and lived in Perm. Since 2022, works and lives in Batumi, Georgia.
CV
Education
2014-2015 — school of engaged art “Chto
delat?” St. Petersburg
2012-2013 — school of contemporary art “Artpolitika”, Perm
2005-2006 — Bowling Green State University, English Literature, Fulbright Grant
1998-2003 — Perm State University, English and Literature
Solo shows
2020 — Culture of materials, PERMM museum of contemporary art, Perm
2013 — Billboards, Green Art Gallery, Perm
Collections
2023 — PERMM Museum of contemporary art
2021 — Ural Hermitage, Yekaterinburg, installation “Gorodki” (“Towns”), wooden bars, large metal staples
2020 — VLADEY auction, Moscow, Vladey. Love and corruption (sold to the private collection)
2017 — VLADEY auction, , Moscow, Vladey. This ain’t Moscow (sold to the private collection)
Selected group shows and other projects
2023
Pause/Play: Culture under Pressure — online and offline part in Yerevan, Armenia
“Сечение” (Section) — Eltsin Center, Yekaterinburg, Russia
Common ground — Pop-up gallery, event by DUO Contradiction, Stockholm, Sweden
“Последствия как средства” (Consequences as means) — Elektrozavod gallery, Moscow
Being here: particles — art laboratory, Makhinjauri, Georgia
ძაფი. Thread. Нить — tmp_space, Batumi, Georgia
თებერვალი. February. Лютий. Февраль — tmp_space, Batumi, Georgia
2022
Connecting the Dots — a group show of the residency “Artists in Exile program”, Ria Keburia Foundation, Georgia
Passengers. Landscape dialogues — gallery “Tsarskaya bashnya”, Kazansky Rail Terminal, Moscow
Feminine totally — Ground Solyanka, Moscow
2021
Postanimation. Disorienting effect — Ground Solyanka, Moscow
Comfortable Memory — video mapping on the factory building, within a series of events dedicated to the Aramil cloth factory, Aramil, Russia
Exhibition of the Award “Innovation-2021” Nominees — Kremlin Arsenal, Nizhny Novgorod
Tochki opory (Fulcrum) — group exhibition, Hermitage-Ural, Yekaterinburg
The Fence/“What’s inside me/us?” — temporary public art, Samara Volgafest 2021, in collaboration with PERMM museum of contemporary art, Samara
Cages for exhibits — site-specific installation at Perm State University, Perm
2020
Culture of materials — personal show, PERMM museum of contemporary art, Perm
Ural Art: Interweaving Communities. Introduction — group exhibition, Sinara art gallery, Yekaterinburg
Waiting hall. Exhibition of Perm artists at Perm II — group exhibition at Perm-II railway station, Perm
Nemoskva is just around the corner — Central exhibition hall Manege, St. Petersburg
Room4us — group zoom project — https://room4us.whiteroom.foundation/
Masters of Empty Space — gallery Lyuda, St. Petersburg
2019
The point of Growth — Gallery KultProekt, Moscow
The 12th Time Zone — A Contemporary Art Report from Russia, Nemoskva project, BOZAR, Brussels
The end of Perm — Perm cultural center, Perm
In Your Trace. Inspirational Forces in Russian and Hungarian Contemporary Art — issuu.com/budapestartweek/docs/nyomotokban_katalogus? fbclid=IwAR1T4lut4PrfEeAXCRzKUmE-wgfzxmsgwQP03EODEV4j4×4hJadGIbKlDyM, Mikve Gallery, Budapest
2018
Transitory state — Shpagin’s factory, Perm
Imya Rek — PERMM museum of contemporary art, Perm
Insects — joint project with Elana Neil, Pop-Up gallery, Brighton, UK
VDNH — www.facebook.com/events/180445019331686 — Marina Gisich Gallery, St. Petersburg
Perm 3 — permm.ru/#/event/perm-tretya-antologiya/, perm3.permm.ru/Slobceva/PERMM museum of contemporary art, Perm
2017
Mechanisms of emergence — cyland.org/lab/exhibition-project-mechanisms-of-emergence/? Lyuda gallery, St. Petersburg
It’s time for me to decay and you to blossom 1-2 — Kunst House, Tartu, Estonia; Voronja Gallery, Estonia
Fractals and structures — Gallery KultProekt, Moscow
The 1st Garage Triennial of Russian Contemporary Art — Museum Garage, Moscow
Culture Patrol - Perm cultural center, Perm
2016
Geopoetics — PERMM museum of contemporary art, Perm
My universities — PERMM museum of contemporary art, Perm
Shape of the unseen — Winzavod, Ceh krasnogo, Moscow
Live emptiness — PERMM museum of contemporary art, Perm
2015
VIDEO JAM @Blaze Festival 2015 — Manchester, UK
Shape of the unseen — Perm museum of contemporary art, Perm
6 collective exercises in utopia: The Children’s Room — Artmuza, St. Petersburg
The promise of landscape — PERMM museum of contemporary art, Perm
Oh yeah, I remember — gallery “Lyuda”, St. Petersburg
2014
Madatac, International official section program — Plaza Cibeles 1, Madrid
Everybody’s a bit worried — a special project of the Moscow international biennale for young art 2014, Nagornaya gallery, Moscow
Thickness — the Art residence space, Perm
2012
Anthropology — Perm Central Exhibition Hall, Perm
View — Artpolitika group exhibition, Art residency, Perm
Publications
Yelena Slobtseva. “Drawing in the Margins: Understanding Doodles”. International Journal of the Arts in Society, Volume 3, Issue 4, pp.87-96. 2009
SLOBTSEVA, Yelena — Drawing in the
margins.Bowling Green: Graduate College of Bowling Green State
University, 2006. 56 p. Master’s
Thesis.
DOI: 10.18848/1833-1866/CGP/v03i04/35475
Selected Bibliography
Triennial of Russian Contemporary Art. Exhibition guide. Sasha Obukhova. Elena Slobtseva, pp.144-145, Moscow, Garage Museum of Contemporary Art, 2017
Анна Суворова, “От “Русского бедного” к “Разрезанию зоны комфорта”, стр. 394-400. //Трагедия в углу: Актуальное искусство России. / Сост. .Щ. Мачулина. Арт-путеводитель. 2018
Вера Гиренко. “В скобах много разных смыслов”. Художник Елена Слобцева — о скобах как метафоре людских сообществ и своей выставке в музее PERMM https://www.newsko.ru/articles/nk-6289537.html — 11 декабря 2020
Innovation-2021, catalogue — Nizhny Novgorod
Russian Art in the New Millennium, Unicorn Publishing Group, 2022, by Edward Lucie-Smith, Sergei Reviakin
Teaching and workshops
2020, 2015-2016 — “Game design”, Perm school of design “Dot”
2019 — “Animation for theatre performance”, Perm school of design “Dot”
2016 — workshop for elderly people at PERMM Museum of contemporary art “Self-portrait on the kitchen board”
2016 — workshop on photo and hand-made augmented reality, Perm cultural center
2015 — workshop “On the tactile”, PERMM Museum of contemporary art
2015 — workshop for children “Magnets, staples, cities”, PERMM museum of contemporary art public program
2015 — workshop for children “Staples and maps”, PERMM museum of contemporary art public program
2014-2015 -“Stop motion animation”, Perm school of design “Dot”
Work in theatre and film
2019 — kinetic object “Tumbleweed” for VityaVilisov’s 6-hour performance “MotherRussia”, Shpagin’s factory, Perm, in collaboration with Arsen Gasparyan
2016 — “Waiting”, The Actors’ house, Perm, animation
2016 — “Hit”, director Margarita Mikhailova, animation over video, artist
2013 — Theatre “Stage-Molot”, Perm, video artist, set designer — “Riverside Drive”
2013 — Theatre “Stage-Molot”, Perm, video artist, set designer — “We’re fine”
2012 — Theatre “Stage-Molot”, Perm, video artist, children’s play “Captain Koko”
