Anti Gonna

Filmmaker Artist

Producer

Step into the suspenseful world of Anti Gonna

Bio

Anti Gonna was born in 1986 in Vinnytsia, Ukraine. She is an independent Filmmaker and artist, actress and trash model. From 2002 to 2007, she pursued a Master's degree in Fine Arts at Grekov Odessa Art School.The artist research’s problems of fears, violence, death and new vision of sexuality and work in such genres as video-art combined with a feature film and an experimental documentary, music video, VR, photography. Lives and works in Kyiv, Odesa and Warsaw. From March 2022 based in Paris in residence Cite Internationale des arts Paris, France.

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My approach

Under an alias AntiGon Staff (Anti Gonna) I’m exploring dimen- sions of sexual fears, perversions and taboos - things that are repressed by the public opinion as the deviant traits. My work is autobiographical, but my imagery are strictly metaphorical and used as means of expression. I think taboos are keeping our minds trapped, therefore they require illumination and not omission, which should allow us to medicate or at least under- stand the repressed “I” a bit better.

The genre of my work com- bines the elements of porn and horror, in a way that neutral- izes any commercial appeal of both. Here, sexual and scary do not go hand in hand to provoke desire as seen in exploitative cinema, but overlap, poisoning the lust of the first and exhibiting cheap effects of the latter. At the same time, AnitgonStaff is a way to deal with trauma, and a ritual to keep the existen- tial dread at bay, rendering it fictional. I translate it to video form, fictional or documentary short films, supplemented with instances of performative art, virtual reality and music video.

Body of work

video

2021

Baby Book

“Baby Book” Children’s album - is a long-term social project in the format of a baby book. It is a reflection and commentary on the experience of violence in the artist’s childhood.

Duration: 02:24, color video

2016 – 2021

Endless story of diseases

he main project of AntiGonStaff with cameraman and photographer Andrei Boyko and consists of 13-th videos. These videos are about the underground society of artists from Kyiv which are shown in a surrealistic genre with the main character, whose name is AntiGonna.

All heroes are united by common sadness, sexual perversions and narcotic pseudo utopia, they are desperate perverts who are unhappy with yesterday, therefore, today and therefore are not sure about the coming day.

Duration 16:53, color video VHS

2018 – 2024

AndreyAndreieva

Consists of dramatized, documentary and game video series, which, through sarcasm and black humor, display trash aesthetics in an erotic direction. The sarcasm is that all the heroes believe in the creation of "Ukrainian art porn" and the rapid and successful rise of such aesthetics. The heroes naively hope that they will be able to independently, without a professional team, technical and material support with promotion, create a new porn art for Ukraine, just for the sake of the idea, often in order to show themselves.

2019 – 2021

Ladder of love for a woman

Video projection about the decomposition of the holo- gram of female love and relationships into pixels and vice versa.

digital color video, sound, mix media

Duration 18:46 min.

2019 – 2020

Friends, I never loved somebody

This is a collection in my diary about real stories of love with only tree rules: 1) only true; 2)written into one page; 3) without the names.

In love relationships it is never important whether you are beautiful and rich or ugly and poor - life can present the most disgusting or ridiculous situations to absurd after which it remains boldly to celebrate your experience.

Duration 11:14, color video, 16:9

2021

Lucid Skin

The protagonist is an artist who reevaluates his identity. He is into self-harm as a way to punish his “masculinity”. After another session, he dresses in drag and goes to the party. At first, he escapes into the fantasy of safety and freedom but eventually and abruptly brought back to reality as the phantasm of masochism takes shape.

Duration 16:17. color video 16:9

2017

Wedding – Funeral

The video explores the institute of marriage and schematizes it to the extent of absurd simplicity, where everything is predictable and stereotyped. If you leave your dream, sincerity and feelings behind, then a “funny” and disgusting routine is the only thing you should stay married to. Video is stylized as a classic Ukrainian tragicomic farce.

Duration 14:43 color video 16:9

2018

The Date

A lesbian short film about internal auto-aggression and desires that are intertwined with reality and sex- ual fantasy. Do we want to love and be loved or turn into a monster who destroys its victim? We are always alone, but sometimes everybody have a Date.

Duration 10:42, color video

2019

Kissing the eye

Lesbian sex drama and fantastic utopia of feelings which show the complex, auto-aggressive attitude of the heroines to themselves and to their love, passion for sex and human relationships. One of

the main misfortunes of the characters is the myth of love. It is a short story about two lost girls who accidentally meet each other in the streets. After some nice time spent together they realise that they dream of becoming lovers with a desire to create violent snuff-video-shooting.

Duration 06:26, color video

2021

Fountain of Wet Desires

Fountain: his version of the source of joy, life and eternal youth. is a construction that is designed to nourish the tabooed and forbidden desires, to give them the right to life, which was im- possible in the system of patriarchal society.

Duration 03:51, color video

2018

The Date

2019

Kissing the eye

Lesbian sex drama and fantastic utopia of feelings which show the complex, auto-aggressive attitude of the heroines to themselves and to their love, passion for sex and human relationships. One of

Selected Exhibitions

I am not here to be stronger than you, Mimosa house, London

Curated by Daša Anosova and Alexandra Tryanova

2023

The first major presentation of works by Ukrainian artists Alyona Tokovenko and AntiGonna in the UK. In the exhibition, autobiographical narratives are manifested through the acts of (auto)eroticism, transgression and pornographic imagery incorporating painting, sculpture, installation, video, and viscerally embodied live art. Hurt and injured bodies are presented in the gallery space through moving images and morphing canvases. Pain as a visual language, and a key theme of the artists’ works, addresses the politics of the current moment.

Velniai KKKC Exhibition Hall, Klaipeda

Curated by Alexandra Tryanova

2021

The central theme of the AntiGonna’s solo exhibition Velniai is dealing with the consequences of psychological violence in her family. The fears and manias that haunted the artist since childhood resulted from the aggressive competition of family members for power over the child. Using symbols of fanaticism and spiritual practices, Antigone unfolds a dreadful theatrical tale of how her relationship with her grandmother shaped her attitude to her body, sexuality, and death. The older woman’s obsession with death, her frightening comparisons of children with worms traumatized the child’s imagi- nation, which subsequently led to phobias and the practice of self-harm. By transforming such complex experiences with art, AntiGonna discusses the most intimate suffering into the public arena and breaks the vicious circle of stigmatizing the victim of violence.

Oksana — AntiGonna: 13, Museum of Odesa Modern Art, Odesa

Curated by Andrii Siguntsov

2021

The exhibition features photographs, video works, collaborations, and performances from the last 5 years of AntigonStaff production. This is the first personal project of the Odessa-based artist in Ukraine, and it includes three complementary parts: a collective project in the Exhibition Hall, video installations in Muzeon, educational lectures and a closing party.

Overcoming various taboos, social stigmas AntiGonna continues her journey towards sexual freedom, equality and emancipation despite serious social obstacles. Her work is the actual art of today, with its questions, contradictions and screaming into the void.