How Art Projects Reveal Inner Worlds

Hi everyone! Welcome to issue 26 of our #ourstudents series — a series of interviews where students talk about themselves and their art.

For this issue I sat down with artist Nataliya Lemesheva, who talks about her move from academic art to contemporary practice through the themes of emigration and adapting to a new cultural code.

Tell us how you came to contemporary art.

I graduated from the Surikov Moscow State Academic Art Institute as an adult. For a while afterwards I painted landscapes, still lifes and portraits with real enthusiasm, until something started to feel missing — meaning. I began thinking about moving into contemporary art, read widely on the subject, studied contemporary art and looked for people who could help me along that path. I talked to a lot of art consultants, but the real shift came after I met Maria. It coincided with my move to Spain, and the new surroundings inevitably left their mark on my work.

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You live in Spain now, but you spent a long time in Russia. Do you feel a difference in how society relates to contemporary art?

Oddly enough, I don’t see a difference in attitudes to contemporary art. It is developing and making its way everywhere. I like the situation that has taken shape in Russia right now, and sometimes I look at the busy exhibition life there with envy. I’d happily take part in shows and open calls if it weren’t for the current difficulties with shipping.

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What themes do you explore in your art? Was the transition from academic art to contemporary difficult?

The main theme in my art is emigration and adaptation to a new cultural code — how an emigrant becomes part of a new environment, the difficulties that come with it, the process of becoming visible.

The transition from academic art to contemporary is certainly difficult. I still haven’t fully broken away from the academic side, and on holiday at my mother’s I happily painted water lilies and roses. But that was exactly a rest — as if I’d put aside my maths and physics textbooks and picked up a novel.

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Tell us more about your most significant projects so far. It would be great to include a photo tour of the fairs and exhibitions you’ve taken part in.

I have two main projects: Shadows and Doors. They keep growing and expanding, and new branches and new meanings keep appearing.

The “Doors” project is a synthesis of anthropological, cultural and psychological research. A door is a unique structural element that defines the border between spaces — outer and inner, one’s own people and strangers — and helps you cross it. Most often I depict the “anteroom,” a kind of liminal space. It is a remarkable object of everyday life, expressing the particular character of its owners, their closedness and, at the same time, their openness to the world. That is exactly why I chose doors as the most eloquent elements, representing not only individual personalities but also the collective identity of the people of a given region.

One branch of the project took shape after a visit to the René Magritte Museum in Brussels. It is a bridge between fantasy and reality, bringing different dimensions together in a single space. Trying to express the personality of the owners, I cut openings of various shapes into the door panels, each of which becomes a kind of gateway into a world of secret images. It is a visual narrative about the hidden stories behind the façades.

In another project I take my paintings of doors, wrap them in industrial plastic film and cover them with graffiti. It is a symbolic act that explores the tension between the slow, handmade making of an artwork and the speed and transience of contemporary materials and street culture; between the openness of doors and the impenetrability of plastic; between locals and emigrants.

At the heart of the “Shadows” project is the use of shadows as a way of exploring a person’s inner world, their emotions, aspirations and unknown sides. The shadow is a metaphorical marker that both separates and connects the visible and the invisible, consciousness and the subconscious.

In my study of shadows the concept of non-duality plays a central role; in my work I look for ways to express non-binary shades and meanings of the visual, moving away from black and white.

I aim for a balance between abstraction and recognisable elements of nature. The shadows on the canvas take on different shapes and outlines, like abstract figures that penetrate one another and form intricate forms. The project invites us to abandon a dualistic view of the world and conveys the idea of the unity and interconnection of all things.

I show my work actively in Russia and in Europe. Recent highlights include a group show at the contemporary art museum MEAM Barcelona in October 2023, the international art fair FIA Barcelona in November 2023, the Summer exhibition in Royal Academy of Art in London, June–August 2024 (a particular point of pride — one of the oldest and best-known contemporary art exhibitions in England), and the contemporary art salon ART3f in Paris in September 2024.

On top of that, my work was published this year in two contemporary art magazines, and in September my interview came out on the site of the Barcelona gallery Altiba9!

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I remember your incredible studio, flooded with light. Tell us a bit about your space and the role the studio plays for you.

Thank you! My studio is a room in the house; a big floor-to-ceiling glass door separates me from the outside world. I meditate there at sunrise and daydream at sunset. It looks out onto a wonderful view of the village and the hills. Everything is drowning in green. I paint my pictures and contemplate the beauty.

But… after three in the afternoon the sun comes in, and it magically turns everything bright yellow, draws shadows of its own, and I can’t work any more. I drop the paints and move on to work at the computer.

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What is your mission in art?

I want to help people, to make them stop and think, to give them a minute to slow down and look inside themselves. I’d like to tell you about two things that happened in the last two weeks. The first was at the salon in Paris. A woman was almost running through the show. I was standing near the exit, so people reached my booth already tired. She was in a hurry, saturated with the exhibition, and then suddenly stopped dead when she noticed my stand. We talked for a long time, discussing thoughts and emotions. It was very moving that my art let her slow down and turn inwards.

The second happened in an English lesson. My teacher, an Irishwoman, recently returned to Ireland after 25 years of living in England and Portugal. She told me how strongly my art resonates with her, that she now feels she spent those 25 years living in the Shadow. She really understands what my project is about, and says she’ll never leave her home country to live anywhere else again.

What matters most to you in art overall? (Particular meanings, values, sincerity, or something else?)

After visiting two big projects this week — Manifesta 15 and Swab Barcelona — I realized that I don’t like shock value. I’d thought contemporary art was moving away from it. What matters most to me are the meanings the artist wanted to convey. I’m happy when I grasp them and they resonate with me. I love sincerity, openness and honesty rather than following fashion. I don’t like experiments for the sake of experiments.

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What’s your favourite contemporary place in Spain that everyone visiting should see?

My absolute favourite contemporary place is Barcelona. The city itself. It is full of contemporary art, from the architecture and all kinds of street installations to graffiti and museums of contemporary art.

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Was studying on our program useful for you?

Absolutely. I’ve come to understand contemporary art and its meanings much better, learned to write texts and put together documents, found out how to run social media, and gained knowledge about presenting my art at exhibitions and designing booths.

After finishing one of the cohorts, a group of us graduates made a project called “City,” applied to an open call at the Moscow Exhibition Halls, won the competition and showed in one of their galleries the following year. After another cohort, with different graduates, we made a virtual exhibition about fears during lockdown; that site stayed up for two years.

So I’m very grateful for all the knowledge and help I got from Maria.