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Past exhibitions

Mother Tongue 09 March — 11 May 2019

Apparition of the Last Soviet Artist in London 16 October — 17 October 2018

ShadowMemory x Art Night Open 07 July — 08 July 2018

ShadowMemory х Ural Biennial 14 September — 12 November 2017

Postponed Futures 26 April — 24 June 2017

Destined To Be Happy 02 December 2016 — 28 February 2017

Superwoman: ‘Work, Build and Don’t Whine' 18 June — 15 October 2016

Unexpected Eisenstein 17 February — 30 April 2016

Between The Lines 26 January — 08 February 2016

Peripheral Visions 02 October — 30 November 2015

Bonobo 17 July — 30 August 2015

DNA Swap 05 June — 11 June 2015

Documenting Ukraine 14 May — 17 May 2015

Borderlands 20 March — 16 May 2015

Bolt 06 December 2014 — 28 February 2015

A Game in Hell. The Great War in Russia 27 September — 26 November 2014

Work and Play Behind the Iron Curtain 20 June — 31 August 2014

The Shabolovka Tower Model 31 May — 12 June 2014

Taint 08 April — 03 May 2014

Kino/Film: Soviet Posters of the Silent Screen 17 January — 29 March 2014

Utopia LTD 21 September — 20 December 2013

See USSR 07 June — 31 August 2013

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Destined To Be Happy

Destined To Be Happy

02 December — 28 February 2017

GRAD is proud to be collaborating with Irina Korina to present her first solo exhibition in London Destined to be Happy. The Moscow-based artist will be taking over the gallery and will transform the space into an immersive environment by creating a site-specific audio-visual installation. Building on her training as a set-designer and exploring multiple social discrepancies between intrinsic and extrinsic well-being, Korina has created six sculptural characters ranging from Love to Rainbow that are placed in the unconventional, even hostile, habitat. The audience will experience the macabre reality of Korina’s greyscale domain, punctuated with characters whose emotional relatability is laid bare for scrutiny. What were once symbols of comfort have been stripped of their warmth, forcing the participants to confront their own socio-political complacency.

Accompanying multi-channel sound installation is produced by Sergey Kasich.

Press Release (PDF)

Destined To Be Happy

25 April — 24 June 2017

A site-specific installation by Irina Korina


Curated by Elena Sudakova

Music by Sergey Kasich


Photographs by Natalia Tarasova


Destined to be Happy, a site-specific immersive environment created by the Moscow-based artist Irina Korina, explores an existential borderline between myth and reality, fact and fiction, theatre and life. Deprived of specific storyline the installation is a game of associations and narratives ranging from Russian fairy-tales to global technology of the future.


Korina’s intervention starts with relocating the usual entrance to the gallery making the viewer enter the space through the fire exit. The frustration of not being aware of one’s surroundings fosters the abstract uneasiness of the space operating in a situation which defies clear definition.


Using everyday mass-produced disposable materials Korina creates personal emotionally charged spaces filled with uncertain expectations and contradictory meanings.  Confronted with the temporary environment punctuated by barren pine trees and inhabited by six mascot-like characters, the viewer is offered no explanation as to whether he is entering a motionless post-war zone, an abandoned construction site or a dysfunctional place of residence. The characters embody the appeal of emotional placeholders but provide little, if any, degree of comfort. Neither dead nor alive, in a state of in-between as heroes in ancient mythologies, they represent commodified versions of global phenomena such as Love, Water, Fire, and Rainbow.  Their very existence in the space is one of uncertainty and absurdity. Looped soundtrack of noises and sounds that usually go unnoticed immerse the viewer in the black and white cinematic nature of this obscure reality. Destined to be happy but doomed with metaphysical anxiety and agitation, the heroes’ identity has split, suiting the generation where emojis or impassive texts are acceptable substitutes for emotional expression.


Juxtaposing concepts of global and local, epic and colloquial, physical and virtual the artist presents her continuous anthropological research into the paradoxes of human existence.  In her works Korina addresses urgent issues of collective memory, cultural and social history and challenges our traditional perceptions of everyday routine.


Spatial electroacoustic piece composed exclusively for GRAD’s Destined to be Happy by the Moscow-based sound artist Sergey Kasich consists of six separate audio channels positioned in the space next to each character. Abstract, critical or ironical, noises are mixed and morphed into each another where the sound of fire becomes the sound of computer keyboard and then transforms into the sound of broken bones.

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Destined To Be Happy Private View

01 December 2016

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