Aes+F Group

2017 edition

AES+F GROUP|Russia  “Inverso Mundus”, 2015

In the multi-channel video installation INVERSE MUNDUS by Russian artists AES + F GROUP (Tatiana Arzamasova, Lev Evzovich, Evgeny Sviatsky and Vladimir Fridkes), the work is inspired by a subject of popular Renaissance engravings and prints “World Upside Down”, known since the 16th century. These engravings contain demons, chimeras, fish flying through the sky and death itself, variously with a scythe or in the mask of a plague doctor.  

The title of the work, Inverso – both an Italian “reverse, the opposite” and the Old Italian “poetry,” and Mundus – the Latin “world,” hints at a reinterpretation of reality, a poetic vision. In their interpretation, the absurdist scenes from the medieval carnival appear as episodes of contemporary life in a multichannel video installation. Characters act out scenes of absurd social utopias and exchange masks, morphing from beggars to rich men, from policemen to thieves. Metrosexual street-cleaners are showering the city with refuse. Female inquisitors torture men on IKEA-style structures. Children and seniors are fighting in a kickboxing match. Inverso Mundus is a world where chimeras are pets and the Apocalypse is entertainment.