Natalya Balabanova is an interdisciplinary artist based in St Petersburg. In her practice, she works with the everyday experiences, context, objects and their concepts and representation. Her multi-level installations are often accompanied by video, photography, and sound. Balabanova also frequently uses Augmented Reality in her works, or the idea of augmentation itself. She worked as the Executive Director at the 2nd Ural Industrial Biennial.
Recommended by Khristina Ots
Petunias Are a Girl's Best Friend, 2020. This project is a documentation of 6 months of coexistence between humans and plants: in the early days of the pandemic, the artist planted 500 petunias in her room
Petunias Are a Girl's Best Friend, 2020. Data gathered from the plants was converted into video and audio materials featured in the installation
Petunias Are a Girl's Best Friend, 2020. As part of the project, Balabanova created Terms and Conditions—a cohabitation contract between the artist and the petunias
Armstrong Vs Armstrong, 2019. A spatial game where Neil Armstrong is landing on the surface of Armstrong ceiling to Louis Armstrong soundtrack, this works speaks of the anxiety about relations between notions, their meanings, and representations
Armstrong Vs Armstrong, 2019
Turn a Café into an Installation; Intention to Order, 2017. In this seemingly simply intervention, the artist reflects on the questions of order and will to power
Turn a Café into an Installation; Intention to Order, 2017
Female Labour; Intention to Order, 2017
Hierarchy; Intention to Order, 2017. In the 1950s, the presence of plants in the Soviet public spaces became mandatory; however, aesthetic or ecological aspects were not considered
Hierarchy; Intention to Order, 2017. Here, Balabanova creates a hierarchy of plants collected from the atrium of the Moscow International University, questioning the idea of aesthetic standardisation
Inside Outside, 2019. ArtEZ Academy, Arnhem. The project was created in response to the situation with the Department of Fine Arts building: even though there was not enough studio space, the administration was planning to reduce it even further
Inside Outside, 2019. The pieces of fabric were pulled out of the windows and pulled back to entrance, blocking the doors. The sound—“elevator opera”—served as another link among the spaces of the building
Milk, 2016. The project was inspired by the aggressive propaganda of natural breastfeeding in 2000s Russia. The artist reflects on her personal traumatic experience that resulted from this trend
