PinchukArtCentre and Ukrzaliznytsia Presented Lesia Khomenko’s Large-Scale Installation Battle in the Trench by February 24
On February 24th, marking the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion Of Ukraine, and as part of the ongoing partnership between PinchukArtCentre and Ukrzaliznytsia, the second large-scale work by Lesia Khomenko — Battle in the Trench — was presented at Kyiv Central Railway Station.
Like the monumental painting Movement, which was shown to the public in August 2025, this new installation was created by the artist in the “Red Hall” of the station, which temporarily became her art studio.
Battle in the Trench exists between painting and sculpture: a 30-meter-long canvas shaped like a trench, is offering an immersive experience. The viewers find themselves inside narrow passages that evoke the physical and emotional space of a trench. The architectural form of the work is based on footage captured by a body camera worn by a soldier from Ukraine’s 3rd Assault Brigade — publicly available on YouTube. The installation serves both as testimony and artistic experiment, allowing those who “walk through” it to physically experience the logic and rhythm of war.
“I carefully reviewed this two-and-a-half-minute video frame by frame. From several key frames, I created a horizontal, timeline-like composition where the beginning, middle, and end of the story appear together on one plane — thus deconstructing the chronology of the original document. Battle in the Trench is a spatial installation based on painting, where time is present through immersive interaction with the viewer and the gradual unfolding of the image. For this work I collaborated with a restorer — together we experimented with traditional techniques of canvas ‘reinforcement’. By layering glue and textile base, we created a sculptural rigidity that allowed the painting to gain qualities of sculpture. Restoration in this piece has a symbolic meaning, serving as a metaphor for healing”
The work was originally created for Khomenko’s solo exhibition Imaginary Distance, held at PinchukArtCentre from August 28, 2025 to January 4, 2026. The exhibition, dedicated to exploring the artist’s creative path and the evolution of her visual language, featured more than fifty works.
Previously, within the collaboration between PinchukArtCentre and Ukrzaliznytsia, Kyiv Central Railway Station hosted Yarema Malashchuk and Roman Khimei’s video installation Arrival and Oleksii Sai’s sculpture Will.
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Photo of Lesia Khomenko: courtesy of Ukrzaliznytsia press office
Photos: Lesia Khomenko, Battle in the Trench, exhibition Imaginary Distance, 2025, PinchukArtCentre. © Photo: Ela Bialkowska, OKNO Studio