In November 2022 I was invited to go to Marseille, France to paint my first collaborative mural project with the Ukrainian artist Danya Kovach. The project was called The Wall, and it was set to paint murals across Europe and the world created from the collaboration of an Ukrainian artist and an international one. According to the curator of this project Kato Taylor and founder of Port. Agency, “The Wall is a symbol of resistance, stability, and armor that fences off Europe from the war. At the same time, the title refers to the Pink Floyd cult album, a rock opera that tells about a hero who is fenced off from the whole world by a wall behind which he copes with his inner demons. The Wall is a visionary and meaningful project at a time when Europe faces a period of erecting new borders - physically as well as mentally.”

I directly quoted her here because I think she puts it beautifully and I just couldn’t do it better.

The main focus of the whole project is to show that Ukraine and the rest of the world have a future together, a bright future of collaboration and prosperity. And with that, comes the collaboration in between one Ukrainian artist and an international one. When brainstorming, we decided to divide the wall into small windows, allowing us, Danya, Dzvynia (Danya’s wife, who also collaborated with the design) and I to run free with our ideas and our own perspectives on the project. We called it “Unfolding Windows”, emphasizing the many windows and doors that will open in the future for both Ukraine, Europe and the world, together.

Traverse De La Charité (Marseille)

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