Daniil Južaninov & Daniil Logovoi
MITTE NATÜÜR, MITTE MORTE
2026
Are still lifes still relevant as an artistic phenomenon in the 21st century? And what does the word “still life” even mean?This exhibition may not answer these questions, but it creates new perspectives on a seemingly simple subject.
The term still life literally means “dead nature,” but where is the boundary between the different states of that same
nature? When are the objects depicted in a painting considered dead, and when are they still alive – and how do
we mark this state of “life” at all? Artists Daniil Yuzhaninov and Daniil Logovoi have created their
still lifes in different media, interpreting this genre from a personal point of view.
At times dark and dramatic, at other times theatrical and romantic, all of these works reflect on the naturalness of the
traditional still life, the composition and coexistence of natural and man-made objects, and the role of death within this
genre. In some ways, the inspiration also comes from a critical reinterpretation of the vast production of still lifes in the
Netherlands during the 16th–17th centuries. The text accompanying this exhibition is a fairy tale written by curator Ilja Yakovlev,
created in place of a traditional curatorial text.
