Natalia Drachinskaya

I am a sculptor and collage artist based in Santa Clara, CA, USA. My work explores the theme of personal and collective memory. Born in the USSR, my childhood experience and years of living in Russia are integral parts of my art.
I graduated from the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA Moscow, Russia). My favorite medium is concrete, but I also enjoy working with analog collage, photography, and 3D sculpture. I have participated in art residencies in Japan, Hungary, Georgia, and Russia.
Until March 2022, I lived in Moscow. After the war with Ukraine began, my husband, two children, and I left Russia. We first moved to Armenia, then to the UAE, where we spent 9 months exploring the new country, culture, and art community. In December 2022, we arrived in California.
Starting from scratch here after leaving all my artwork and materials in Russia, I am fortunate to have a small studio now, where I can work with concrete and collages. I am currently an instructor at the Pacific Art League, teaching college-level courses, and I volunteer at the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University. This experience has been a great source of inspiration, allowing me to meet outstanding people and gain deep knowledge of art, particularly Rodin's sculptures.
My work has been exhibited in locations such as the Pacific Art League (Palo Alto, CA, USA), Nick Gallery (Pécs, Hungary), The Ren House (Dubai, UAE), Art Kvartal (Yerevan, Armenia), Tbilisi Multimedia Museum (Tbilisi, Georgia), Street Sans Frontier (Paris, France), CCA Winzavod (Moscow, Russia), MOMMA (Moscow, Russia), MAMM (Moscow, Russia), Cube Moscow (Russia), "Presence" Festival by Fotodepartment (Saint Petersburg, Russia), Festival of Contemporary Art "Art-Subject" (Vladimir, Russia), Blazar Art Fair (Moscow, Russia), and many others.


Artist Statement

The central theme of my artistic practice is the subjective study of the mechanisms of deconstruction and reconstruction of memories. One of the most significant traits of memory, for me, is its retroactivity. Slavoj Žižek describes it in The Event as the ability to change the present and future by reconstructing the past.

Through sculpture, collage, and photography, I explore the reassembling algorithms of memories. My personal research delves into the memories and stories of the past. I draw inspiration from the life stories of my ancestors and family members. They experienced the final years of the Russian Empire, WWI, the communist revolution, WWII, Stalin's Gulag, the collapse of the USSR, and Putin's Russia. Despite these hardships, they maintained their human values, critical thinking, and inner strength.

In sculpture, I primarily work with concrete, which evokes memories of Soviet childhood and Soviet architecture. Concrete is a foundational material and a metaphor for the role of memory in constructing self-identity. Like memory, concrete can exist in different states and forms: cold or heated by the sun, hard or cracked. Concrete is also a heavy material, and its weight can be metaphorically compared to the burden of personal memory and traumatic experiences.

I was born in the USSR, left Russia in 2022, and now live in the USA. I know well the mechanisms of self-reassembly in difficult times. My art practice reflects this process, and I hope to inspire others to find inner strength for a sustainable future.


www.drachinskaya.com

What initially drew you to art?

Photography and curiosity have always been my guides. I hold a degree in economics and worked for many years in a creative agency. After the birth of my daughter, I became interested in photography: I started studying its technical aspects and the history of photography, conducted shoots, learned from other photographers, and even taught photography at a university.

One day, I came across the book Photography as Contemporary Art. I was captivated by the idea that photography could be more than just a snapshot. That led me to enroll in a two-year program on contemporary art at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Moscow. There, I learned how to work with concepts and select media that best convey an idea. Currently, my favorite media are concrete sculpture and collage/mixed media. I also have a long-term project: an artist's book based on working with my father's photo archive.


What elements of your life have ended up becoming a part of your art?

My practice is rooted in my personal experience and family history. This is my primary material. I was born in the final decade of the USSR and lived in Russia, where I gained deep knowledge of my relatives' history and the hardships they faced: the First and Second World Wars, the 1917 Revolution, the GULAG labor camps, and the tumultuous 1990s.

Since March 2022, I have not lived in Russia. I first moved to Armenia, then to the UAE, and for the past year and a half, I have been in California.

This experience is universal: we encounter traumatic events, face them, accept them, and change. Each of us undergoes a process of self-reconstruction, with memory's mechanisms of remembering and forgetting at play. We live in a present that is uncertain and volatile. The foundations we relied on yesterday may be destroyed today. The question is: how and where do we find new ones?

I express this process through personal stories. Concrete symbolizes experience and memory—heavy, often difficult to bear—but from it, we can construct a solid wall of protection against external catastrophes. Memories and experiences can be reassembled into new forms that nourish us. My sculpture series Transformers is an exploration of this. Paper also serves as a metaphor for memory's ephemerality and fragility. The act of collage mirrors the process of reconstructing our memories.


What about your practice do you find the most fulfilling and/or energizing?

For me, the most crucial moment in my practice is when the work resonates with the viewer, sparking a conversation. It's as if a door opens to a new space filled with associations, personal stories, meanings, and emotions. I like to think of contemporary art as an invitation to dialogue—a key to a new door.


Tell us about your experience getting to where you are now. What has been the most important thing you’ve learned?

In the past two years, significant changes have occurred in both my life and my art practice. I have lived in four different countries, faced a great deal of uncertainty and anxiety, and lacked a studio and the opportunity to create physical objects. These limitations were due to the complexity of moving with large art materials. I even tried living as a nomad with only a laptop in hand.

The most important realization I had is the power of human connection. Existing relationships can grow stronger over distance, and new people you meet along the way can offer much-needed support. My experiences and knowledge can be valuable to them as well.

I've also learned that you can continue your art practice even without a physical studio. I explored various computer programs for creating 3D objects and effectively set up a digital studio. I even completed a personal project in the metaverse with the support of Chimera Platform and 8XR. I invited artist friends who, like me, had lost their usual art practices due to relocation. Together, we explored new ways to create art, interact, and support one another.


How has ‘community’ impacted your artistic practice?

I have maintained connections with part of the Russian artist community and have built new connections with art communities in Armenia, the UAE, California, Hungary, and Japan—countries where I have lived and attended art residencies. Interactions with other artists, their ideas, and discussions about the process of creating art are vital to me. Through these encounters, I have come to understand how open and supportive art communities can be.