The exhibition Embodied Memory Rooted into a Ruptured Landscape explores the intricate relationship between memory, the human body, and the land as vessels of history, trauma, and resilience. Through a series of paintings and works on paper, Alina Zamanova (b. 1993) examines how lived experiences of war and turbulence become physically and emotionally inscribed—not only within individuals but also within the geography they inhabit.
At the heart of her practice is the exploration of how personal and collective histories are embedded in form, texture, and gesture. The works in the exhibition span a range of scales, from intimately sized portraits to monumental landscapes. Recurrent motifs, such as Ukrainian landscape and objects like anti-tank hedgehogs, serve as visual metaphors for resilience, transformation, and the imprint of war on society and nature.
The exhibition considers how land, marked by invasion, becomes a repository of memory, carrying traces across generations. Ukrainian landscape is not a neutral setting but a witness—one that absorbs the trauma of war and the instability of memory. A blast wave transforms into a symbolic rupture on the canvas, where land and sky bear the weight of destruction. Trees, stripped bare, become emblems of both devastation and endurance, their twisted forms mirroring a nation’s resilience. The juxtaposition of natural elements with remnants of war—metal anti-tank hedgehogs, now scattered across cities—reflects how destruction has embedded itself into daily life. These landscapes, captured through photographic references, are shifting memories, where nature mourns, resists, and adapts, testifying to both loss and survival.
Just as Zamanova’s landscapes absorb and reflect the weight of ongoing historical events, her self-portraits, too, become vessels of war memory, inscribed with the traces of private recollection and collective experience. In her ongoing series “Days of Full-Scale War,” she documents episodic memories of the war in Ukraine through self-portraits painted with Ukrainian soil—an element that references both the land and its resilience.
Embodied Memory Rooted into a Ruptured Landscape invites viewers to witness the parallels between human presence and the land, both acting as witnesses to disruption and the possibility of overcoming trauma.
The exhibition will run through April 5, 2025 at Mulier Mulier Gallery Brussels.
