Lisa Zakharova

tekenen , spiritualiteit , schilderen , muurschildering , Lichaam , keramiek , Figuratief , Educatie , Community

Within my practice I develop a personal mythology, weaving symbols together to reflect on the wistful occurrences of the world. Each of my works is an exercise in world-building, where I assemble a story that is frightening, a story that is hopeful, or, more often, both.
I construct my narratives from the pieces of the
collective subconscious, which can be found in fairytales, dreams, rituals, superstitions, and cultural traditions. Places where we store our beliefs without voicing them, where the oldest human impressions of the world can be found.
Therefore, the mediums I work with also don’t belong specifically to contemporary times. Painting, woodwork, and ceramics are chosen to further the tradition of documenting the world as we imagine it is. As I too imagine it is.

**Behing the seas, behind the mountains** - 2024, 100x50cm, oil on canvas Reflection on home and identity. Perhaps, the woman is a dream of the village, or the village is a dream of the woman. Their interaction is an embodiment of my desire to belong. To become a hill, like a Scandinavian legendary giant, and stay for eternity because a hill doesn’t run away.

**Let the dream go, where the night lays** - 2024, 150x100cm, oil on canvas The name of this painting is a Russian proverb that acts like a spell. People say it three times to banish a nightmare. This painting was inspired by studies of hell and heaven in Eastern European and Eastern pagan traditions. Here, I assemble those symbols into an image of me trapped between death and dreaming, fear and fantasy. An advice to myself how to behave in the face of loss and terror.

**Outgrown#2** - 2025, 120x100cm, oil on canvas A continuation of the series. The girl is trying to fit into the counters of the house, mimic its shape with her body, contain herself inside. The house is a border between inner and outer worlds, and it is disappearing, only a simulacrum idea of it left.

**Outgrown#1** - 2025, 120x100cm, oil on canvas In some fairytales Baba Yaga is described as filling her house fully, with her nose sticking out the window, or a foot out of the door. Anthropologists attribute those descriptions to the house being symbolic of a coffin, thus fitting her exactly or almost so. In this painting I reinvent this image for myself, a house reminiscent of my dacha, and a girl bigger than it is - a reflection on growing out of your childhood home but perhaps still clinging to it.

**Matters of spirit - spirits of mater** - Group exhibition at KunstpodiumT. All matter finds itself in a state: solid, liquid, gaseous. People live in states too: stressed, calm, energized, crying, asleep. The concept of this exhibition brings those together, by tracing networks of connectivity between the physical and conceptual, the body and spirit; to take upon a bolder exploration of who we are, what we are, and erasing the border between those two. The experience of having a body can be both a grounded one and an alienating one. Are you it? Do you own it? What layers of your body constitute your actual self? Are fantasies, dreams, folklore, and songs a part of it? Are the inner molecular brewings and reactions part of our identities? Elements that our cells are assembled from have been here since the dawn of time. Do they remember it? Is it our memory too?

**Dissolve** - 2026, 41x31cm, oil on paper

**Outgrown exhibited at Brienenoord island**

**Outgrown series exhibited at Vrij Paleis Amsterdam**

**Do-Gooder** - This wearable mask brings to life inner monsters and fears. Do-Gooder is an entity who wants to do everything at the same time, grabbing at tasks with his fourteen hands. He is most afraid of failing to do everything at once. The project was realized for a performance at W139 as a part of Mette Sterre’s mini-residency.

**World patterns** - 2025, 150x100cm, oil on canvas, cotton thread This work is inspired by the myths of the northern peoples of Russia concerning the structure of the world. On Selkup tambourines, the levels of the world are often depicted as circles supporting one another. In this painting, the circles literally support one another, stitched together with threads. The painting is an amulet, and when viewed through it, any surroundings become part of a magical world order.

Artistic workshops

Datum: 01-05-2024 t/m 31-10-2024

Locatie: Buitenplaats Brienenoord

In samenwerking met: Buitenplaats Brienenoord

Teaching workshops in painting, drawing and artistic research as a part of Buitenplaats Brienenoord weekly eilaand atelier program. The workshops are for the local community, both for adults and kids.

https://www.buitenplaatsbrienenoord.nl/2024/08/eilandatelier-3/

Deze kunstenaar heeft nog geen toekenningen.