Europe After The Rain

2024
AI, Post-Photography, Brutalism, Max Ernst, Slava Ukraini

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Europe After the Rain II is a surrealist painting by Max Ernst, completed in 1942, the work captures the sense of destruction and chaos prevalent in Europe at the time and features a desolate, almost alien landscape with bizarre, organic forms. The painting is often seen as a commentary on the ravages of war, and it becomes the starting point for exploring feelings of sorrow about the war in Ukraine.

One, with greedy eyes, 
Looks far out, past the horizon, 
Whether there remains 
Some country he can seize and bear
With him to his grave; 

From "The dream" (A comedy) poem of Taras Shevchenko

The Cyrillic letter yi is a unique character in the Ukrainian alphabet and does not exist in the Russian alphabet. It is pronounced like "yee" (as in "yeast") and is one of the quickest visual clues to tell the two languages apart.