Until October 30, 2025, the Unité d’Habitation Le Corbusier in Marseille is hosting Ithaca, the first part of a double exhibition accompanied by a program of screenings dedicated to Ukrainian-American photographer and visual artist Yelena Yemchuk.
Yelena Yemchuk left Soviet Ukraine in 1981, at the age of 11. Some fifteen years later, she returned to her home country, now independent and in the grip of oligarchic capitalism. Barely having completed her studies in art and photography, her camera became the instrument of a successful career in fashion and music production.
Ithaca is therefore the logbook of the final stages of Yelena Yemchuk’s personal odyssey. A notebook filled with unpublished personal archives from the 1990s and 2000s, a selection of photos of a country that has been fighting against Russian aggression for more than three years. An exploration of the recognizable themes of her work personal identity, physical or sexual, youth and self-affirmation, which is however also a further step in her understanding of changing Ukrainian identities, and beyond, a tribute to the resilience of Ukrainian women of all generations.
Yelena Yemchuk: Ithaca / Ithaca
*Galerie Kolektiv, Cité Radieuse, Unité d’Habitation Le Corbusier, Marseille
July 11-October 30, 2025 (Exhibition, Part 1 & Screenings)
*Galerie The Naked Room
Reitarska 21, Kyiv
November 8-December 21, 2025 (Exhibition, Part 2)
