Installation view of Álvaro Urbano, Disobedience After Hilma af Klint (Kalyna), 2026. Still Joy — From Ukraine Into The World, Biennale Arte 2026. PinchukArtCentre. © Photo: OKNO Studio.
On the second floor of the palazzo, Álvaro Urbano stages an unlikely situation: two blooming kalyna plants (Viburnum opulus) thrive within the gallery’s architecture. Though they appear to have sprouted from the floorboards, these plants are meticulously crafted from metal and handpainted. A sculptural gesture that provides permanence to a fleeting moment.
In this setting, Urbano uses the kalyna as a narrative vessel to explore the intersection of botany and resilience. While the plant is deeply embedded in Ukrainian folklore, literature, and oral history—where its red berries typically convey social and geographical belonging—Urbano reimagines its form to communicate the weight of current affairs. By rendering the plants with white spring blooms rather than their characteristic red berries, the artist shifts the focus towards the future, transmitting a sentiment of tenacity, anticipation, and hope.
This sense of arrested time extends to another element of Urbano’s installation, where raindrops have stopped while running down the windows of the exhibition space. Suspended in a single moment, they prolong this instant for the entire summer, fracturing the temporality of the installation with what can be seen outside, making the sunny days to appear even brighter. In a world where experiencing nature in its organic fullness is often not an option, these sculptures serve as botanical symbols of endurance.