In this absorbing series, the artist depicted ostensibly separate events — a religious cross procession in the provinces and an open-air rock festival — to suggest shared forms of collective spirituality. 2008. Series of 5 photographs. C-print. 103 × 280 cm

Arguably Bratkov’s most celebrated work, the video installation Balaklava Drive was filmed in one of the bays of Sevastopol in Crimea. Premiered at Regina Gallery in 2009, the work soon brought the artist Russia’s most prestigious contemporary art award – the Innovation Prize. On encountering the installation, the visitor first sees a large screen showing a group of young men enthusiastically diving into a water reservoir, possibly in an attempt to impress nearby girls, as th

Dog-friendly show. The invitation to this exhibition in Switzerland specified that it was for visitors with dogs only. All objects were placed at dog’s-eye level and were edible or lickable: trees with real sausages, distinctive smells. The dogs were happy. The artist himself owned a dog. Installation view: Mproject 21st Century Fine Arts, Geneva, Switzerland, 2009 2009. Series of 10 mixed-media objects (C-print on wood panel). Dimensions variable.

Now, in retrospect, Bratkov’s work with the telling title Crossroad may be regarded as one of the earliest visionary premonitions in Russian art of things to come. It was also indicative of the artist’s novel methods and startling motifs, which increasingly came to dominate his aesthetic vision in the new decade. The twelve framed, red-tinted photographs — depicting typical sceneries and characters of “my Moscow” — are arranged in a montage-like manner to form the equivocal s

The rather shocking photographic series Kualnik contributed to the sense of disturbing ambivalence that Bratkov sought to capture at the time. In a shabby, tiled room with rusted pipes, bodies lie wrapped in dirty blankets. What is in reality a popular salt-bay resort near Odessa equally resembles the aftermath of violent conflict, an improvised morgue, or a similar scene.

The Orange Revolution in Ukraine, which began in November 2004, culminated in the victory of Viktor Yushchenko in the second round of the presidential election on 26 December 2004. On the evening of 26 December 2004, at the moment the election results were announced, an exhibition event took place in a courtyard in central Moscow. Accompanied by the sound of protesters striking metal barrels — recorded by the artist in Kyiv — the announcement of the results unfolded as a publ

Ukraine  is a photographic project by contemporary artist and photographer Sergey Bratkov that unfolds as a visual journey through his native country, offering a direct and at times absurdist portrait of a culture situated between tradition, Soviet legacy, and the accelerated influx of modern consumerism. Created using a panoramic camera, the series explores heterogeneous spaces - rural seaside resorts, urban industrial sites, monuments, and leisure parks - observing both lan

The artist’s elder brother, Yury, based in Kharkiv, has been a protagonist or collaborator in a number of video works. (Regina Gallery once featured them in the exhibition BratFest ; brat means “brother” in Russian.) 2009–2019. Series of around 20 videos. Durations variable. the opening of BRATFEST . City Municipal Gallery. Kharkiv, Ukraine, 2019

Bratkov’s second decade in Moscow saw a significant body of works in which images were juxtaposed with neon-light texts to create ambivalent tensions and mental ruptures. The first, produced in 2010, consisted of the neon slogan Long Live the Bad of Today for the Good of Tomorrow set against a panoramic image of a raucous social gathering — a Soviet propaganda slogan curiously reincarnated in the late Putin era. Yet the darker the decade became, the emptier Bratkov’s images a