Koshta Inverts the Art World. Interview With Its Founder

by Sophie She

Koshta Turns the Art World Upside Down. Interview With Its Founder

16 Apr 2024

koshta.collective is an innovative community of media artists, art directors, creators, producers, and curators who dare to traverse the bounds of conventional artistry. The collective emerges as a pioneer of boundless imagination, showcasing an unparalleled fusion of physical and digital art that transcends the limitations of reality.

Recently debuting at Art Dubai with a profound impact, koshta.collective has already etched its mark on the global art scene through its participation in prestigious events like the Blazart Art Fair in Moscow and the Art in Space festival in Dubai. Their journey is characterised by a relentless pursuit of pushing artistic boundaries, evident in their diverse collaborations with esteemed brands such as Nike, Alexander McQueen, and influential cultural figures like Anne Imhof and Post Malone.

For Art Dubai 2024, koshta.collective unveils a groundbreaking project that challenges conventional curatorial practices. Operating beyond the confines of traditional gallery formats, they offered visitors a transformative experience within a specially crafted booth — a magical realm where art defies norms and perceptions are renewed. And by the way, you can read more about that experience here.

koshta.collective operates under the slogan — “We truly believe in boundless imagination and create our works beyond the limits of conventional reality” — which you can find on their landing page. And so, forefronting the breaching of barriers and pushing the boundaries, meet Evgeniya Afanasieva, the founder and creative producer of koshta.collective.

— Tell me how you came up with the idea of creating koshta.collective.

— Everything flowed out of my background. I have been working at Stereotactic Studio [Stereotactic is a full-spectrum content company, producing commercial campaigns for major brands] in Moscow since 2016. I came there as a line producer on a resume and was engaged in advertising. In general, my entire background was related to video production and CGI graphics. So, when I joined Stereotactic, I was shooting ads for many brands with various great directors from across the globe.

One day, we realised that Stereotactic did not work with a very specific category of brands that were concentrating on Art Direction in their campaigns. Requests like “make it beautiful” or “we want our ads to look like art or fashion” just didn't get into the studio since Stereotactic had a completely different focus.

So, Pavel Karykhalin, the owner of Stereotactic, and I decided to come up with another brand and open another studio that would work specifically with the request “make it beautiful”.

That is how it started. We have become a studio focused on Art Direction. In general, there was no question of any Digital Arts there at that time. When we came up with it in 2019, there was not even such a territory in the CIS market. So, we started exploring who could provide an artistic vision for the brand’s content in our home market. We decided to look for visual artists, understand who “does it beautifully,” and generally build our visual identity.

koshta.collective at Art Dubai

— So you decided to do everything at home?

— Yes, it is just that we decided to explore another visual territory that we hadn't entered before. When we opened the studio, we did a survey on Instagram of those who work with Russian frames with visual content. We discovered a niche that we are currently engaged in — the Multimedia Artist category. We searched for artists who used to work with different mediums of visual culture and found a whole universe of young talents working in creative and art direction, multimedia art, digital art, installations, and much more.

So, we released the koshta.collective. Collective — because it is an association of talents. We aimed to build a community that we would develop in terms of commercial and art projects.

Before officially partnering with the artists we discovered, we took the time to test their capabilities by commissioning work from them ourselves. So we tried to work with them, making sure that we liked it, that everything worked out, and that we liked the process of working with this artist. Only after that did we include them in our community, develop them, show their work to the market, and thus bring orders to make projects.

Our first customers were the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art and the V-A-C Foundation. We made promo campaigns for exhibitions , and then we helped video artists implement their video art using our production service. So, all of our creative efforts converged towards "art," marking the moment when we crystallised our mission: koshta.collective provides Artistic Services for Expanding Imagination. And every word is absolutely correct here.

Now, the studio is three and a half years old. We initially focused on video production and visual content during this time, leveraging my background and expertise in these areas. However, as we began to shape our community, we realised that limiting ourselves to working only with visual content. We discovered artists who brought unique talents beyond traditional art direction. For instance, some excelled in object design, while others concentrated on prints or installations. This diversity enriched our roster of artists, which now is about 50 people.

Starting as a studio focused on projects with brands, institutions, and media, we have expanded our scope. We not only handle project work but also promote our community. When you have artists in your network, it is essential to showcase their creative output. While we may work on projects for brands like Alexander McQueen or media like Hypebeast Korea, we also feel compelled to highlight the ongoing creativity within our community. This inspires us to develop new initiatives to showcase the work of all the artists gathered around us. This is how it all works out at the moment.

For example, our participation in Art Dubai elevates our value and visibility among the art and creative markets, fostering a symbiotic relationship between creativity and commerce. This organic synergy benefits everyone involved — the potential clients and the artists themselves — who experience growth both in their commercial projects and as artists. It is important to keep this balance and uphold the collective philosophy.

koshta.collective at Art Dubai

— Which regions do you typically source your artists from?

— Despite the fact that it all started in Russia, we worked with the international market from Russia. For example, with Nike, Hypebeast, or McQueen. But since we have opened a studio in Dubai, we are ready to consider international creators and are very open to projects with them anywhere in the world.

— Tell us about your project with Anne Imhof, which was shown at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam.

— Of course. So, the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art, as the main commissioner of one exhibition, turned to us to help the great contemporary artist Anne Imhof with the production of her digital work, which was created especially by her solo exhibition. There, we worked rather as a production service, helping her provide her vision in the medium of video and organising all the filming processes that were needed for this work to be released. However, in the end, because of the war, this exhibition did not happen in Moscow, and this work was shown at the Stedelijk Museum. We initially did not even know about it, and it was a very pleasant surprise for us.

— I am an absolute fan of the work; I really liked it.

— It is really powerful. The most valuable thing for us was that we were entrusted with a fairly large project. It was four shooting days, a big shoot. And the filming itself was still quite unusual. It was held in the black room, where Eliza was on a horse, like a kind of limbo that connected everything. And there were more projections of Eliza, where only she and the horses remained.

Honestly, filming 10 horses in Chertanovo [district in Moscow] posed quite a challenge, as Chertanovo itself is a unique art object within Moscow. Picture this: we had to block off an entire city block just so a herd of horses could run through it, all to capture the footage Anna Imhoff needed. It was super challenging.

— Could you please describe what creative and art directors do?

— A creative director is the one who comes up with an idea. It is difficult, although it seems that it costs nothing to come up with an idea. A unique idea is the ultimate win, and if you brought this idea to visual reality (this is the responsibility of an art director), then you won doubly. Anyone can come up with ideas, but creating ones that are relevant and have the potential to succeed is the real challenge.

The creative director sets a creative, conceptual direction. The art director helps with this direction to visualise it. This is why, in our studio, many artists combine a creative director and an art director — they come up with and implement their own work.

Koshta Weekend 2023

— And how do you choose artists for the Collective? What kind of criteria are there?

— This is a difficult question, because there is no criteria — just gut feeling of some kind. In general, the whole identity of koshta.collective, which has now been formed in three and a half years, was originally built on the diversity and inspiration that artists give themselves, regardless of the medium they work with.

For example, there is i61, who is generally a musician and came up with his visual universe filled with such small characters called ToTs, and he integrates them everywhere — in his music videos, in merch, well, that is, wherever, in the visual universe that he makes, here, there are such characters.

I should say that we adore playing with ‘analogue/digital’ worlds. In 2021, we released a ‘Breakdown’ visual book, consisting of unreleased 3D artworks of i61 and visuals from another artist - Anon Reva, working with mixed media. It was an absolutely crazy mix combined in one book that was released in a limited edition of 250 pieces Celebrating the Year of koshta.collective. Besides that, we held an exhibition dedicated to this book at our studio in Moscow. And after this event, we realised that we generally like to do offline events.

— Is that how Koshta Weekend was born?

— Yes! When you used to work with a space, conceptualise it, fill it with artworks, you want to dive deeper in it and find a place to show it all in one place. So in our case we decided to set up our own festival bringing young talents, art and music together.

"Breakdown" book presentation by koshta.collective X Reva X i61

— What is the global mission of koshta.collective?

— To show young contemporary artists. When we organised the first festival, our mission was to bring art and emerging artists to the forefront and demonstrate what could happen if we bridged the gap between the audience and art by presenting works in a highly accessible environment. Typically, young artists' works are not prominently displayed in galleries, so we opted to create an event with minimal distance between the audience and the art. In the first year, we featured 10 artists and collectives; in the second year, that number grew to 35 artists, and we expanded our area of 2000 square metres covered by art. We filled every inch of this space with diverse artworks.

For example, at Bounce Club, attendees danced among artworks by Sasha Frolova, who had recently exhibited in Paris. Whether the audience was aware of it or not, they simply enjoyed the atmosphere. For us, it was amusing and meaningful. We don't see anything negative or shameful about this approach; instead, we view it as a way to popularise art and break down traditional barriers.

Collaborating with young-blooded artists is incredibly inspiring because they often come up with ideas that challenge conventions. Sometimes, these ideas are things we wouldn't have considered on our own, highlighting the value of teamwork and idea exchange. I connect these ideas with opportunities, and together, we bring them to reality. This collaborative synergy is essential to our success; we rely on each other's strengths to break the boundaries of imagination.

— And what would be such a direct super dream project that you would like to receive?

— Like a big city festival. Damn, that would be so cool.

— And in which city?

— Well, probably Barcelona.

— Barcelona?

— Well, yes, because we all love the Primavera. You just find joy there, with music for every taste and an artistic setting, whether you are on an ordinary stage or a partner stage designed as an art object. It is a pleasant experience to be there.

The thing is that people attend music festivals not just for the music, but for the experience. And in general, emotions and feelings are a very important asset now, after COVID. If you can evoke emotion, then you win.

These are very difficult times; everyone is burning out, and it is very tough to maintain a stable moral state. So if you can get joy and emotion somewhere, then they will come to you again and again. And it is generally joyful, positive, such a vibe that we build around ourselves, and which we try to broadcast through any platforms, our website, our Instagram, parties that we do, or exhibitions where we select works, and it should all be about emotions, about impressions.

But it is more likely that such plans are a little far-reaching. We are some kind of punks — we will go to Art Dubai without being a gallery.

— I have another short blitz. French fries or rustic potatoes?

— Rustic.

— Water or soda?

— Water.

— A sweater or a jacket?

— The jacket.

— Overdressed or undressed?

— Overdressed.

— Sweet or salty?

— Salty.

— Online or offline?

— Offline.

— Pizza or pasta?

— Pasta.

— And the pizza with or without a crust?

— Without.

by Sophie She

Koshta Turns the Art World Upside Down. Interview With Its Founder

16 Apr 2024

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