Igor Konovalov, Infaton

Igor Konovalov’s sculpture Infaton is part of the artist’s Infodelics series that explores the impact of the digital environment on humans and their perception of the world.

The work reflects the state of modern culture and of life within a continuous flow of data. Last century’s art often explored the subjective experience of humankind and its subconscious whereas Konovalov addresses the new reality in which digitalization had become an integral part of our everyday experience.

The sculpture presents a recognizable silhouette of a bunny, an almost childish, simple and familiar image. That said, the artist deprives it of its visual integrity. The form consists of shiny spheres that leave the impression that the object had been assembled from separate fragments. The author calls these elements “infatons,” imaginary particles of the information field.

The work is reminiscent of Jeff Koons’ famous Rabbit (1986), but the meaning of these sculptures is radically different. Koons turned an object of mass culture into a symbol of the consumerist era. Konovalov, on the contrary, disassembles a familiar figure into separate elements, showing a world in which the main value is no longer an object but personal experience in IT technologies.

The work becomes especially resonant in the sculpture park. The spheres’ mirror surface does not present a single fixed image, constantly changing with the environment and creating new reflections of the space around it.

Olha Konovalova, art historian