Aiming to bring a new exhibition experience by moving arts to the digital environment, we have launched ‘Almost There’, the fourth edition of the digital arts platform ‘Museum without Walls’. For the first time this year, the exhibition curators were selected outside of Turkey as well, and this year’s curators are Teona Burkiashvili from Georgia, Tatiana Kochubinska from Ukraine and Seyhan Musaoğlu from Turkey. 

‘Almost There’ features selected artworks from Georgia, Turkey and Ukraine alongside the works of artists in the British Council Collection to create an extensive assembly of art in its various forms, including photography, video, recorded performance art, painting and installations.

A journey through 'Location', 'In Between' and 'Dislocation'

Reflecting on separation and displacement, the exhibition consists of three separate chapters that offer artworks which explore humankind's eternal wish to define our own place in relation to a country or our internal aspirations. By embarking on a circular journey, exhibition visitors explore the idea of a universal identity and the role which visible and invisible borders play in our everyday lives.

It features artworks from the British Council Collection alongside 35 other works of art in various forms by contemporary and classical artists from Turkey, Georgia and Ukraine.

Digital exhibition to remove obstacles

‘Almost There’ enables visitors to experience and discover the exhibition at their own pace and without any limitations of time or physical capability. The exhibition offers detailed text and audio-visual information on every piece and artist, including accessibility enhancing features such as audio description, sign language, contrasts and text enhancing, which are compatible with text-to-speech programs for the visually impaired. This allows everyone with an internet connection to visit the exhibition space, contributing to the idea of art which is accessible for all.

Exhibition launch livestream

To mark the launch of the new exhibition, we are organising a one day conference which will explore the topic of arts in the digital landscape on Tuesday 11 February at 13.30.

You can watch the live recording of the conference here or by visiting the exhibition platform.

About the curators

Seyhan Musaoğlu (Turkey)

Seyhan Musaoğlu is a sound artist, performer, curator and the founding director and curator of Space Debris, an independent art space with a focus on innovative dialogue with a collective soul. 

Her focus both as curator and performer is creating a fluid experience that considers the relationship between exhibited space and the people within it, challenging the usual constraints to the viewer. Musaoğlu holds her Bachelor of Arts Degree from Brandeis University in Fine Arts and Theatre with high honours, and her MFA from Parsons, The New School of Design, Art, Media and Technology, New York. 

Musaoğlu has shown her interdisciplinary work internationally in locations including Boston, New York, Istanbul, Tokyo, and Curitiba. Following her MFA, she began performing internationally with collaborations in sound and experimental noise. Musaoğlu made her curatorial debut when she founded {SØNiK}Fest, the sound, new media and performance festival in New York City in 2009.

Teona Burkiashvili (Georgia)

Teona Burkiashvili is a Georgian-born UK-based artist and curator. She graduated from Tbilisi Academy of Arts in 2007 and continued her studies at LUCA School of Arts and Design and then at Central Saint Martins College and at the University of the Arts, London. 

Her core practice centres on investigation of random, every day, pop-up, imaginary and visual material. Her interest spans painting, moving image, advertising, art education and philosophy, employing multidisciplinary attitudes and trans-media methodologies. 

As an independent artist and curator, she has been actively working on various projects and exhibitions internationally in Georgia, Belgium and the UK.  

Before joining the project, she was an associate on the EU-Eastern Partnership Culture and Creativity Program, run by the British Council in Georgia.

Tatiana Kochubinska (Ukraine)

Tatiana Kochubinska graduated from Art History and Arts Management at the National Art Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture. She started her professional career at the Kyiv Museum of Russian Art, where she worked as a researcher and curator from 2006 to 2011. 

In 2010, she had an internship at the Neuer Aachener Kunstverein (NAK, Aachen, Germany) with the support of the Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen (Institute for Foreign Cultural Relations). Between 2012–2014, she took part in the Curatorial Platform study programme organized by PinchukArtCentre, Kyiv. Since 2019, she has worked as an independent curator and writer. 

Her main expertise is Ukrainian contemporary art. From 2016 to2019, she curated the Research Platform of the PinchukArtCentre aimed at creating a digital archive of Ukrainian contemporary art. Within the Research Platform, she edited the book PARCOMMUNE. Place. Community. Phenomenon devoted to Kyiv squatting group, Parcommune.

In her curatorial practice, Tatiana deals with questions of responsibilities, memory, and trauma, connecting the Soviet past with today’s society. This is reflected in a series of exhibitions such as Guilt (2016), Anonymous Society (2017), and Motherland on Fire (2017). She curated the PinchukArtCentre Prize in 2015 and 2018 and co-curated Future Generation Art Prize in 2019 and the FGAP@Venice as a collateral event of the 58th Venice Biennale.

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