business from zero
This project is a visual exploration of cultural and economic transformation through a feminist lens, examining how spaces are inscribed with meanings that reflect and shape identity. Growing up between two cultures after emigrating from Kyiv to the Netherlands, Yelena returned to her birthplace and was struck by the pervasive presence of paper advertisements plastered across public spaces in Kyiv. These decaying ads, disintegrating under the elements, became a powerful metaphor for the collision between Eastern and Western values and economies. Through her lens, Yelena captures the ads’ relentless intrusion into the cityscape and even nature, reflecting how consumerist culture permeates and alters even the most organic environments. The project reflects feminist theories on the body and space, where traditionally feminine, natural landscapes are invaded and overwritten by symbols of economic ambition and patriarchy—manifested in a paper wasteland that speaks to both entrepreneurial drive and decay. Yelena’s work suggests that this visual clutter represents a consumerism shaped by historical and political forces, an economic scramble that leaves its mark on the landscape and reminds us of the inevitable mortality of material pursuits. Her photographs of these abandoned ads create a hybrid space between East and West, capturing a Ukraine that is both foreign and familiar, past and present, marked by cultural nostalgia yet pulled toward globalization. Business from Zero critiques not only commercial fanaticism but also highlights the way patriarchal capitalism objectifies spaces, as seen in feminist critiques of how public and private spheres intertwine. This visual decay symbolizes Yelena’s own displacement, an emotional and physical estrangement shaped by both her heritage and the forces of modernity.
