PALIANYTSIA 2022
PALIANYTSIA 2022
The Forest by Zhanna Kadyrova presents a woodland that grew in a year on the site of an artificial lake built on Ukraine's largest river, the Dnipro. The artificial lake created by the Kakhovka Dam, which was destroyed in June 2023 as a result of Russia's war of aggression, was enormous in scale. The sudden release of water caused by the explosion resulted in an environmental disaster, leaving more than 40 towns and villages, tens of thousands of people and animals stranded by floodwaters. The drinking water supply and food security of more than 700,000 people were jeopardized. In addition, pollutants that had settled at the bottom of the reservoir were released into the water, creating a long-lasting reservoir of pollution that could be washed over an even wider area during future floods.
Part of the area was mined during the war, making it unsuitable for human use and dangerous for numerous animal species. “Return of life or toxic time bomb” was the headline of an article published in The Guardian in July 2025, which discussed the situation of the forest that is the subject of Kadyrova's work.
The construction of the dam 75 years ago was a violent act comparable to its demolition in terms of the area's environmental diversity and cultural identity. Construction began in 1950, at the end of Joseph Stalin's (1878-1953) dictatorial reign, as part of his large-scale industrialization projects to ensure the Soviet Union'sself-sufficiency. Technological progress was combined with
grandiose exercise of power, and the culture of the local people
had no value in Stalin's eyes.
An immeasurable amount of the region's cultural history and artifacts were buried under the huge artificial lake. According to archaeological research, the area has been inhabited for five thousand years and is particularly known as the cradle of Cossack culture in the 16th-18th centuries. Part of this history has been preserved on the Dnipro's largest island, Khortytsia, Zaporizhzhia oblast, where the island's museum of the same name preserves the area's natural and cultural heritage.
The Kakhovka Dam reservoir also covered a large forest and marsh ecosystem called Velikii Luh [Great Meadow]. In the summer of 2023, the reservoir was drained, and just one year later, the area has grown into the now two-year-old forest described by Kadyrova in her work. The forest, named after its predecessor Velikii Luh, is a testament to the power of nature, as the willows and poplars that dropped their seeds at the bottom of the drained reservoir in
the spring grew to three to four meters in height in just one year, forming the largest forest plain in the Ukrainian steppe.
The forest has grown faster and with greater species diversity than humans could ever have achieved in the same time. Numerous plant and animal species are returning to the former reservoir area, but the drought brought about by climate change and plans to rebuild the dam threaten its future. The work features video footage shot by the artist,showing the forest that has grown in place of the artificial lake at different times of the year and day. Amidst the trees swaying in the wind, a boat can be seen floating at the water level of the former artificial lake.
The boat is both a measure of the forest's exceptional vitality and a monument to the area's past as ‘Kahovka Sea’, as the locals called the artificial lake, which is gradually disappearing into the forest. In another video, the boat travels through time from morning to dusk, night, and dawn, accompanied by moonlight, fog, sunrises, and sunsets. Together they appear as a cyclical image of a landscape in which past and future utopias and dystopias simmer.
The past, present, and history of the place are present not only in the video parts but also in the documents, which present the history of the dam construction of the Dnipro River and its tributaries, known in Ukraine as a symbol of the cycle of nature. Throughout history, waterways have attracted human communities to establish villages and cities in their vicinity as enablers of food production, good transport connections, and trade.
There is a battle raging on two fronts over the future of the Kahovka dam. There are good reasons for rebuilding the dam and the artificial lake: they would secure the drinking water and agricultural irrigation needs of southern Ukraine. If the dam is restored to its former state, the repair work would take about five years to complete. This would mean that the forest would once again be submerged and the emerging, largely unexplored ecosystem would disappear. The nature value of the forest is also being discussed in Ukraine.
From a climate perspective, this forest's new ecosystem offers significant opportunities for carbon dioxide capture and storage, according to the 2025 Ukrainian War Environmental Consequences Work Group (UWEC) report.
“This is an opportunity we cannot afford to miss,” says Eugene Simonov, international coordinator of Rivers without Boundaries, in a Guardian article in July 2025.“If Ukraine decides to protect Velikii Luh, it will not only save the
landscape, but also decide to believe in its own future,” adds Oleksiy
Vasyliuk, co-author of the UWEC's 2025 report on the reservoir and head of the Ukrainian Nature Conservation Group. “At stake is our biocultural sovereignty, which means our nature, our identity, our independence, and what kind of nation we want to become.” The main characters in Kadyrova's work are the forest and the water system, which are the life-sustaining systems of our planet.The third main character is the human being, whose actions have
endangered both of these life-sustaining systems, not only in the case study presented in the work, but on a planetary level. The work conveys a powerful image of the landscape, the nation, and humanity at a crossroads where the possibilities of both utopias and dystopias exist simultaneously. However, the unusual vitality of the forest described by Kadyrova pulsates with hope for both post-war and ecological reconstruction. For the time being, the cycle of life in this forest is still determined by nature and its own laws. The lives of plants and animals are guided by the knowledge of how to sustain life. It is the human race whose boat is in danger of sinking. But if we disappear into the forest like the boat, we still have hope. Zhanna Kadyrova’s The Forest is the IHME Helsinki Commission 2025. It was exhibited as a site-specific installation at the Steam Power Plant in the Old Town Rapids, the very place where the city
of Helsinki was founded in 1550.
PAULA TOPPILA
THE FOREST, 2024–2025. Echoes of Tumult, exhibition opening, Bethanien, CTM Festival 2026, Berlin (Germany), 2026
THE FOREST, 2024-2025. IHME Helsinki Commission 2025, exhibition view, Power Plant Museum, Helsinki (Finland), 2025