Polina Isurin

Polina Isurin

  • About
    • Bio
    • Resume
    • Contact
  • Paintings
  • Installations
    • Beyond Translation: Moving Between/Across/Through Languages as Part of a Research Practice
    • remove, replace, add
    • ASU Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law
      • Text & Photo Documentation
      • Ethical Manipulations- Video Projection
      • Justice- Video Projection
    • Rootlessness
      • Text & Photo Documentation
      • Rootlessness recording
    • Buried Secret (Obelisk for the Future)
    • Azores, Portugal
  • Writings, Videos, Mixed Media
    • Mixed Media
    • Writings
      • Obelisk for the Future
      • The (Un) Consumable
      • XY
      • Dокuмент [x] along with artwork 'Nonfunctional Green Card for The Gulf War'
    • Videos
  • Community Murals (in collaboration with students)
  • Archive
Constructed wooden obelisk, marbleized in acrylic paint, and buried in the ground under sheet of glass.

“For once we assign monumental form to memory, we have to some degree divested ourselves of the obligation to remember…

...the counter-monument thus flouts any number of cherished memorial conventions: its aim is not to console but to provoke; not to remain fixed but to change; not to be everlasting but to disappear; not to be ignored by its passersby but to demand interaction; not to remain pristine but to invite its own violation and desecration; not to accept graciously the burden of memory but to throw it back at the town’s feet.”

                                                                       James E. Young



I was once told a story about a Soviet children’s game that taught trust, where children took treasures and buried them in a disclosed location under a piece of glass. The location would be shared with a single friend, letting a child learn to trust another person with their secret. Combining this narrative with the ancient, and still common practice of memorializing, I am asking questions about how art shapes individual and collective memories. This installation was created in a remote location and showcased in various exhibitions only through documentation.