Mappa Mundi 2021

Editor: Here we have Pavlo Makov’s “Mappa Mundi” from 2021, a drawing that looks like a very detailed architectural plan. It’s fascinating, but a bit unsettling—like a blueprint for a labyrinth. What emotional resonances do you find in this piece? Curator: The labyrinth is an apt analogy. Architectural plans, especially imagined ones, have always held a potent symbolic charge. This isn’t just a set of instructions; it's an ideogram, a complex system of encoded meanings about space and our relationship to it. Consider the recurring motif of 'exit' – repeated, almost insisted upon. Editor: I did notice that "ВХІД / EXIT" repeated near the top of the plan, slightly off-center... Is it meant to evoke a sense of urgency? Curator: Exactly. In the tradition of the *mappa mundi*, it is not simply geographical. The architecture evokes systems; like language it is both ordered and unstable. Are the symbols offering escape or highlighting confinement? The repetition of 'exit,' juxtaposed against this maze-like layout, suggests a contemporary anxiety about freedom versus control. This tension has a powerful history, informing art during and after periods of conflict. Does that read on your understanding? Editor: It does, especially with the artist's background and where he’s from. Seeing it as more than just an architectural plan opens up a lot of avenues for interpreting it. Curator: Precisely. It invites us to ponder the psychological weight of the spaces we inhabit. What is truly a home? Is there an inside, and therefore an outside, to ourselves? We respond deeply to line and form when presented as a drawing or an imagined location for ourselves. Editor: I see it as an intriguing meditation on those boundaries, personal and architectural. Curator: And that interplay is exactly where the power of Makov’s symbolism resides.