Cosmism

The exhibition delves into Cosmism, an early-twentieth-century philosophical movement that sought humanity's salvation through technology, conquering death, and exploring outer space. Within a single exhibition space, the show offers a condensed journey into the utopian and dystopian realms of Cosmism. Cosmism features works from the Khardzhiev collection and recent acquisitions by Ukrainian artist Fedir Tetianych from the 1970s and 80s.

According to Russian philosopher Nikolai Fedorov, one of the founding figures of Cosmism, technological and scientific advancements would grant humans immortality. He also believed that everyone who had ever lived should be resurrected. Since this would lead to Earth’s overpopulation, humans would be compelled to conquer outer space, where the resurrected would live on colonized celestial bodies. 

Cosmism had an enormous impact on scientists, revolutionaries and artists, who sought to capture these visions of the future in their work. The exhibition focuses on the artist Vasily Chekrygin (1897–1922), one of the movement’s most exceptional adherents whose drawings envision the various stages of human resurrection as described by Fedorov. Figures ascend and fall, shrouded bodies dissolve in a vastness of planets and stars, embodying what Chekrygin refers to as the ‘exodus from chaos to cosmos’.