KYIV.- Near East, Far West will present not only new works commissioned especially for this show, but also numerous works from European museum collections. The exhibition opening 3 October 2025 is part of the 6th edition of the Kyiv Biennial, and was prepared thanks to extensive international cooperation. In light of the war underway in Ukraine, the biennial is being staged not only in Ukraine, but also in Warsaw, Antwerp and Linz. The presentation at MSN Warsaw is the main exhibition of the Kyiv Biennial 2025.
Near East, Far West—Kyiv Biennial 2025 is the fruit of cooperation by the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw within L’Internationale, a European confederation of museums, art organizations and universities. The show was prepared by an international team of curators, enabling the exhibition to include numerous complementary perspectives. The exhibition traces the interrelated histories within the region which the curators call “Middle-East-Europe”—a territory including Central & Eastern Europe, post-Soviet Central Asia, and the Middle East.
The galleries at MSN Warsaw will be filled by works by artists for whom the violence of war is a defining context and overarching horizon. Visitors will see the Platinum Collection of Ukrainian avant-garde art from the Mystetskyi Arsenal in Kyiv, currently stored at the museum in Warsaw. There will also be loans from the collections of member institutions of L’Internationale. The show will feature seven new works commissioned especially for the Kyiv Biennial and created thanks to the support of Ribbon International, an independent organization promoting Ukrainian art through exhibitions, events, and commissions of artworks. The new works arose with a view to the current social and political context, in the shadow of the war in Ukraine, genocide in Gaza, and the broader fascist turn in global politics. The artists whose works are shown include such names as Dana Kavelina, Tolia Astakhishvili, Nikita Kadan, Lesia Vasylchenko, Basel Abbas & Ruanne Abou-Rahme, Saule Suleimenova, Majd Abdel Hamid, Hito Steyerl, Ali Cherri, and Oraib Toukan.
“The exhibition focuses on past and present trajectories of colonial violence and genocides in Middle-East-Europe, where various forms of imperial exploitation are still ongoing,” said Vasyl Cherepanyn, co-founder of the Kyiv Biennial and co-curator of the exhibition. “The title Near East, Far West points to the present geopolitical reality, but also an ethical attitude, and calls for a reassessment of the notions of East and West.”
Works displayed in the exhibition show how violence has permeated all spheres of life, eroding social cohesion and solidarity. The destruction of paintings and sculptures, repression of artists, and poisoning of the land by war and exploitation are a consequence of the past and present militarized reality of Middle-East-Europe. By addressing wartime trauma, corporeality, displacement, exile and occupation, the selected artworks offer a critical response to the devastation of social, environmental and economic structures.
Many of the works attempt to come to terms with the injustices and atrocities committed by past and present forms of imperialism and colonialism, reflecting a historical awareness of the role of art in significant, though ultimately unsuccessful, emancipatory visions.
Magda Lipska, a curator at MSN Warsaw and co-creator of the exhibition who is also leading the current activities of L’Internationale, explained: “This year’s edition of the Kyiv Biennial arose as a gesture of solidarity on the part of several European institutions, from Poland, Ukraine, Belgium, Sweden and the Netherlands. We are brought together by our shared work within L’Internationale, a network of European museums, academies, and art institutions. L’Internationale shows that institutions don’t always have to be rivals, but can also learn from one another and benefit from mutual support.”
