About the project
Sea Battle by Oleksii Minko and Volodymyr Prylutskiy (The Schmidts)
The artists Minko and Prylutskiy (aka the Schmidts) come from, or frequently visited, the city of Berdyansk on the Azov Sea, which is currently occupied by the Russian Federation. In 2025, they set up two cameras in Odesa, on the coast of the Black Sea, in order to create the impression through video recording and photography that they are not on the Black Sea but on the Azov Sea, while simultaneously reminding viewers that this is an illusion.
In the recording, Minko and Prylutskiy play the school game Sea Battle, using sand as a grid-like playing field. But unlike their childhood experience, their opponent is beyond the horizon, in another sea. They shout out letters and numbers, trying to hit something they no longer have access to, and from which they receive responses only in the form of missile strikes. Each grid square corresponds to an action: screening fragments from a YouTube vlog by a Berdyansk poet featuring the waters of the Azov Sea, replaying an audio recording of the Azov Sea’s waves, taking photographs against the backdrop of the Black Sea, and persuading viewers that these photos were actually taken at the Azov Sea.
The performance consisted of two parts: spectators followed the recording process on one of Odesa’s beaches and were given the opportunity to examine the artifacts offered by Prylutskiy and Minko more closely. On 14 December, the artists presented the second part of the performance as a two-channel work-in-progress video at the Odesa National Fine Arts Museum. One screen showed a viewpoint that intensified the illusion of being on the Azov coast, while the other showed the spectators and the camera, whose presence reminded viewers of the constructed, artificial nature of the “mirage.”
A conversation is also part of the performance, beginning when the record button on the cameras is pressed. While the audience waits for the “start” of the performance, Minko and Prylutskiy talk about their native context of Russified cities: switching between Ukrainian and Russian; confusing Pushkin and Shevchenko; insisting on the belonging to Ukrainian culture of figures who used the Russian language or even betrayed its national interests; recalling toponyms and personal experiences from places to which they remain emotionally attached. The spectators present at the recording observe the conversation but cannot hear it. Instead, in the video, Minko and Prylutskiy leave the image out of focus while ensuring full audio transmission of the dialogue.
In this way, the contexts displaced by a new social consensus become public through the Schmidts, yet the Schmidts themselves remain uncertain about the status of the experiences that shaped them — experiences now distant from them both geographically and historically.
About the authors
Oleksii Minko is an artist from Berdyansk working with performance, video, and writing. He graduated from the Dnipropetrovsk Professional Art College with a degree in Puppet Theatre Actor and the M. Dragomanov Ukrainian State University with a degree in Philosophy. Minko has participated in exhibitions at the steinstudio, Ukraiinskiy Dim, a member of the Musical Collective. He participated in residencies by the Asortymentna kimnata (Ukraine) and the Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art (Poland), the Work Hard Play Hard events, and apartment exhibitions for the birthday of curator Oleksandra Pogrebnyak. Mink lives and works in Kyiv.
Volodymyr Prylutskiy is an artist and film critic from Donetsk, Ukraine. He is a student pursuing a Master’s degree in “Cinema Studies” at the I. K. Karpenko-Karyi Kyiv National University of Theatre, Cinema, and Television. He has participated in apartment exhibitions, the docusynthesis exhibition, the projects gareleya neotodresh, crowd connection, miskiy teatr, Solomiya Magazine. Co-curator of the film club TsOP. Prylutskiy lives and works in Kyiv.
Presentations
- The work in progress took place on 11 December 2025, on one of Odessa’s city beaches. On 14 December 2025, the artists presented a video version of the work in progress at the Odesa National Fine Art Museum
Teaser
Additional resources
- Release about the presentation of the work in progress at Odesa Journal
- Release about the presentation of the work in progress at Left Bank
- Release about the presentation of the work in progress at BR24
Implementation team
Production proto produkciia
Executive producer Olga Diatel
Line producer Yuliia Parysh, Iryna Onishchuk
Assistant producer Viktoriia Zhembrovska
Communication and media coordination Oleksii Havryliuk (proto produkciia), Maria Lityanska (Odesa National Fine Art Museum
Copywriter Maria Agisian
Photo Ivan Sytiy
Poster design Yaroslava Kovalchuk
Video documentation Denys Bohdan, Daria Sokolova
Supported by
Sea Battle work in progress was created with the support of the Antonin Artaud Fellowship within the second South edition 2025, which focused on independent artists from the South of Ukraine. That edition of the Fellowship was implemented by proto produkciia foundation in partnership with the Odessa National Fine Art Museum and the MY ART Platform with the support of the International Renaissance Foundation.