This screening unveils two newly commissioned artworks that extend Mykola Ridnyi’s exploration of Ivan Mazepa’s contested legacy – a political and military leader of the Zaporozhian Sich and Left-bank Ukraine in the late-17th and early-18th century, whose story has been mythologized throughout European art and literature and demonized in Russia.

Famously, many historic depictions of Mazepa have focused on the story in which he was apparently punished for having an affair with a Polish Count’s wife. His punishment was to be tied naked to the back of a horse and set off into the wilderness. Over the centuries it has caught the attention of many artists, writers and poets (e.g. Gericault, Delacroix, Vernet, Byron, Pushkin, Voltaire, and Słowacki).

Ridnyi’s trilogy started with The Battle Over Mazepa (2023), which reimagines the historic literary clash between English poet Lord Byron and Russian poet Alexander Pushkin as a contemporary rap battle. It completes with two new works: Mazepa's Ride (2025), a surreal musical fantasy with a soundtrack by Ukrainian band Lyudska Podoba, examining gender transformations of Mazepa in his cultural representation; and Poltava (2025), investigating how the 1709 Battle of Poltava continues to influence ideologies and identities today.

New works are commissioned by the Kyiv Biennial, the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw and John Hansard gallery in Southampton with the support of RIBBON International and Foundation Foundation.