Vladimir Nabokov Museum in St.Petersburg presents the exhibition “How to catch a moth?” — a poetic reflection on escapism, memory and migration in the context of Vladimir Nabokov’s writing practice.
Starting from one of the writer’s inherent and unexpected hobbies — catching moths, the exhibition offers an artistic look at the comprehension of the processes of physical and spiritual displacement associated both with the issues of Nabokov’s migration and with the experience of his autobiographical travels through the halls of his own memory, which are of a dreamlike nature.
“The question I proposed in the title of the exhibition,” says curator Ilya Kronchev—Ivanov, “is a trap from which every artist tries to get out in his own way, answering, rather, the question “how to still not be caught.” Nabokov himself managed to do it as many as four times, despite the fact that once he himself, being euthanized by ether, was straightened and unfolded like a butterfly from his collection.”
The exhibition is located in three halls of the museum (a small Dining Room, recently opened Green Living Room and Library), forming an enfilade parallel to the main exposition. The works of contemporary artists are site-specific and integrated into the museum and memorial space, entering into a dialogue with the legacy of Nabokov. Thus, the exhibition rethinks not only the events from the writer’s life, but also the phenomena that humanity is experiencing today.
Artists: Lera Lerner, Galya Fadeeva, Maria Dmitrieva, Alina Kugush, Zhenya Muzalevsky, Denis Prasolov, Natalia Fedorova.
