MAXIM ZHESTKOV

Maxim Zhestkov作为一位俄罗斯视觉艺术家，对动画、设计和摄影的喜爱已达到极致，令人更惊讶的是他能够完美地把三者结合及运用到艺术场景装置中，他的创作实践主要围绕着随视觉语言变化而变化的数字媒体的效果展开。他运用数字技术再现当代画廊的类似场景，这些数字形式经过了精心设计，其复杂的、富于节奏感的运动与周边环境产生了互动。并且他的作品进一步拓展了传统白色立方画廊空间的边界，提出了在数字媒体的影响下愈发突出的时代艺术应该如何被观看、体验的问题。一系列的独特创作风格让他的作品拥有超高的人气加持，一路成为当前艺术界炙手可热的创作“明星”。

As a Russian visual artist, Maxim Zhestkov has taken his passion for animation, design, and photography to an exceptional level. What is even more striking is his ability to seamlessly combine all three and apply them within artistic installation environments.

His creative practice primarily revolves around the effects of digital media as shaped by evolving visual languages. Through digital technology, he recreates scenarios reminiscent of contemporary gallery spaces. These digital forms are carefully constructed, their complex and rhythmical movements interacting with the surrounding environment.

His works further expand the boundaries of the traditional white-cube gallery space, raising increasingly relevant questions in the age of digital media: how should art be viewed, experienced, and encountered today?

With a distinctive creative style, Zhestkov’s works have gained remarkable popularity, making him one of the most sought-after creative “stars” in the contemporary art world.

《Volumes》是Maxim Zhestkov利用计算机图像生成技术创作的CG影像作品，在其中蕴含了针对自然法则与情感的思考。亿万个彩色粒子在画面中舞动，在看不见的命运之手的操控下，进行彼此的交流、互动，像是观赏了一副极具艺术气息的作品，令人如痴如醉。

颗粒在虚拟空间中不断重合、分离又变化，每一个时刻的每帧画面都像是声音与运动融合而成的数字雕塑，创造出无限可能性。而这也凸显了艺术家的“小心思”：试图探索生命与宇宙背后的过程。

一大波黑色小球迅速变色、忽而粉蓝、忽而又粉红，再切换到黑色，整个群体旋扭在一起，如同被施了魔法的乌贼，以融入环境来躲避捕食者。

《Volumes》目前现正在展览“海的轮廓Silhouette of the Sea”中展出，是这个“网红作品”在中国的首秀。影像中数十亿粒子的运动让人联想到自然界海浪的运动轨迹，作品中的每一帧都呈现出一个新的数字雕塑形状，融合环境声音和粒子的运动，表现出强大的张力，如同狂欢的乌贼，持续变化其形态和颜色。也为静谧的深海环境平添了一点亮色。

Volumes is a CG moving-image work created by Maxim Zhestkov using computer-generated imagery, embedding within it a reflection on natural laws and human emotion. Billions of coloured particles dance across the screen, communicating and interacting under the control of an invisible hand of fate. The result is like witnessing a highly artistic composition—utterly mesmerising and immersive.

Within the virtual space, these particles constantly overlap, separate, and transform. Every frame, at every moment, resembles a digital sculpture shaped by the fusion of sound and motion, generating endless possibilities. In this, the artist’s subtle intention also becomes apparent: an attempt to explore the processes underlying life and the universe.

A vast swarm of black spheres rapidly shifts in colour—at one moment pink-blue, then suddenly pink, before turning black again. The whole mass twists together like an enchanted squid, blending into its surroundings to evade predators.

Volumes is currently on view in the exhibition Silhouette of the Sea, marking the Chinese debut of this “viral” work. The movement of billions of particles in the film evokes the trajectories of waves in the natural world. Each frame presents a new digital-sculptural form, combining ambient sound with the motion of particles to produce a powerful sense of tension. Like a reveling squid, it continually changes shape and colour, adding a vivid brightness to the tranquil environment of the deep sea.

Elements是Maxim Zhestkov所创作的一部关于自然、物理、艺术和爱情的实验艺术电影。黑与白的碰撞，是纯粹的、压抑的，也是易爆发的。该作品用无数黑白圆球来表达超过20亿的粒子被自然张力与重力所控制，从而发生集体运动的宏伟场面。数以万计的球体带来的视觉冲击，像是一个个的呐喊者，不屑于被轨道控制，在漫无目的地滑动、漂浮与旋转中，表达自身不愿被束缚的情感，从而探索环境和自我内心的关系。

Maxim Zhestkov表示：“这个装置是一个尝试，提出一种观念，即在复杂的关系和环境中，我们周围的一切包括我们自己，都是由简单的元素/块组成。“我们可以把这个想法投射到情感、行为、思维过程、关系、生命、星球甚至宇宙中。”
在密闭空间中，每一个粒子都可以放肆做“自己”，每一个房间墙壁上都标记了微妙的文字内容。没有花式的装扮，只靠单纯的、无意识的流动、扩散、在压力中涌动，也能自成主角。

Elements is an experimental art film by Maxim Zhestkov that explores nature, physics, art, and love. The collision of black and white is at once pure, repressed, and on the verge of eruption. Through countless black-and-white spheres, the work conveys the grand spectacle of more than two billion particles being governed by natural tension and gravity, setting off a collective movement. The visual impact created by these innumerable spheres feels like a chorus of silent outcries—refusing to be confined by轨迹? translate as “refusing to be controlled by fixed trajectories”—and through their aimless sliding, floating, and spinning, they express an unwillingness to be bound, while probing the relationship between environment and the inner self.

Maxim Zhestkov states: “This installation is an attempt to propose the idea that everything around us, including ourselves, is made up of simple elements or blocks within complex relationships and environments. We can project this idea onto emotions, behaviour, thought processes, relationships, life, planets, and even the universe.”

Within the enclosed space, each particle is free to become fully itself, while subtle fragments of text are marked across the walls of each room. Without elaborate ornament, the work relies solely on pure, unconscious movement, diffusion, and surging under pressure—yet even so, it becomes its own protagonist.

Layers是Maxim Zhestkov的催眠艺术影像装置，融合了数字图形、艺术和设计，开发了新形式的移动形状与图形。正如名字之意，此装置就像叠加了一个又一个的彩色图层，呈现出一个不断变换形状与面积的块状物。

由计算机生成的暗黑几何形体，被隐形的3D物体解剖，Maxim Zhestkov用充满创意的艺术角度审视着layers充满活力的内部结构层次，从立方体、棱镜到球体，用锐利、绚丽的分层颜色，显示其复杂的内部几何形状，从而探索内外部的并置。

Layers is a hypnotic moving-image installation by Maxim Zhestkov, merging digital graphics, art, and design to develop new forms of moving shapes and imagery. As its title suggests, the installation resembles layer upon layer of colour stacked together, presenting a mass that continuously shifts in both shape and scale.

Computer-generated dark geometric forms are dissected by invisible three-dimensional objects. Through an imaginative artistic lens, Maxim Zhestkov examines the dynamic internal structure of Layers—from cubes and prisms to spheres—using sharp, radiant bands of colour to reveal its complex inner geometry, and in doing so, explores the juxtaposition between interior and exterior.

Computations 是Maxim Zhestkov打造的一部最新实验性质的影像作品。就像是预测了一个遥远的未来，当计算生物体从我们的笔记本电脑这个不透明的“黑匣子”移动到现实世界，数以万计的不明颗粒朝我们“袭来”，用技术性的手段来呈现粒子的运动轨迹，足够令人心生震撼。

当粒子受周围环境与声音的影响起起伏伏地波动、聚拢与分散，更像是集体参与了一场极具仪式感的互动。如同一用一种潜在的秩序感来操控华美的空间编排，在毫无防备的“变色”中，倾诉自身的饱满情绪。这些形式巧妙地嵌入到建筑与创意中，在空间中表演游走，每一个微小的元素，都可以构建出一个优雅的整体。

Maxim Zhestkov擅长制作一系列的催眠视觉实验，展现一些质地不明的颗粒物在看不见的力量操控下，游离、粘合或变形。而因为自身有学建筑的背景，所以他对于每部作品都少不了【物理定律】的考量。而他所创造的空间，看上去像一个正在进行试验的实验室，或是陈列装置艺术的美术馆房间，由荧光灯泡或房顶天窗提供光源。其实这些鲜明的白色或黑色的房间，都是计算机生成的哦~当然如果你还持怀疑态度，不妨来“海的轮廓”艺术展查收更多惊喜吧，在这里，你将在触手可及与遥不可及间体验真假切换。

Computations is Maxim Zhestkov’s latest experimental moving-image work. It feels almost like a prediction of a distant future: when computational organisms move out of the opaque “black box” of our laptops and into the real world, tens of thousands of unknown particles seem to surge toward us, their trajectories rendered through technological means in a way that is deeply striking.

As the particles rise and fall, gather and disperse under the influence of their surrounding environment and sound, they resemble participants in a highly ritualistic collective interaction. It is as if a latent sense of order is orchestrating a magnificent spatial composition, while sudden shifts of colour become a way of expressing full and vivid emotion. These forms are cleverly embedded into architecture and creative space, performing and drifting through the environment; each tiny element contributes to the construction of an elegant whole.

Maxim Zhestkov is known for creating a series of hypnotic visual experiments, often featuring particles of ambiguous materiality that drift, adhere, or deform under the control of invisible forces. Owing perhaps to his background in architecture, each of his works is shaped by a strong consideration of physical laws. The spaces he creates often resemble laboratories in the midst of experimentation, or gallery rooms displaying installation art, illuminated by fluorescent lights or skylights overhead. In fact, these stark white or black rooms are all computer-generated.

And if you still have your doubts, why not come to The Silhouette of the Sea exhibition and discover more surprises for yourself? Here, you will experience the shifting boundary between what feels within reach and what remains impossibly distant, between the real and the unreal.

Maxim Zhestkov对数字环境中人造光和颜色的行为颇有研究。即使他在之前的作品中多运用黑白色，但为了能精确体验与捕捉自己心中完美的艺术感，近年来，他也在探索着不同色彩所呈现的多样可能性，并表明：“用色彩创作，打开了我一扇新的门，通向新宇宙，带来了巨大的灵感和鲜明的情绪。”

艺术家们的世界总是像粒子般难以说明缘由，当然，越是难以把控，我们越能看到意料之外的惊喜。此次“海的轮廓”艺术展，除了呈现Maxim Zhestkov的《Volumes》，更有多位艺术家及摄影师的作品，从多元化的艺术视角去探讨“海洋保护”的议题。
艺术家们通过自身作品，向大众传输海洋与自然对人类的重要性，形式百变，意义却深重而长远，用艺术映照现实，我们除了膜拜更多的还是要充满敬畏心，用心呵护海洋卫生及安全，这样我们才能在未来看到更多所期待的可能性~

Maxim Zhestkov has conducted extensive research into the behaviour of artificial light and colour within digital environments. Although his earlier works often relied on black and white, in recent years he has also begun exploring the diverse possibilities offered by colour in order to more precisely experience and capture the artistic sensibility he envisions. As he states: “Working with colour has opened a new door for me — a door to a new universe, bringing immense inspiration and vivid emotion.”

The world of artists is often as difficult to explain as the movement of particles. Yet the more difficult something is to control, the more unexpected surprises it may reveal. In this edition of The Silhouette of the Sea, the exhibition presents not only Maxim Zhestkov’s Volumes, but also works by a number of artists and photographers, approaching the issue of “marine conservation” from diverse artistic perspectives.

Through their works, the artists communicate to the public the importance of the ocean and nature to humanity. Their forms are varied, yet their meanings are profound and far-reaching. By reflecting reality through art, these works invite us not only to admire, but also to hold a deeper sense of reverence — to care for the cleanliness and safety of the ocean with sincerity, so that in the future we may continue to encounter the possibilities we hope for.