Alive and made of wood: the Universal Mind moves to Nikola-Lenivets

The artist frames his works, which are a mix of modern art and traditional crafts, with astoundingly beautiful landscapes of forests, fields and the Ugra River.

Photo: a lighthouse made from elm and iron rods.

The Universal Mind is made up of mechanical hemispheres – a lace-like entanglement of 50 kilometres worth of wooden beams and 42 columns: “the columns are like rockets, capable of both receiving information and flying off to spread it.”

“We improvised the whole time. It’s pointless to crate mock-ups if you can do things easier. We moulded the art object as if from clay. You don’t need any special skills for this – every average farmer knows how to do it. It’s common knowledge.”

Polissky worked on his Universal Mind for nearly three years, and, as usual, he was not alone. Some 20 local residents work with the artist as full-fledged members of the creative process.

The wooden hemisphere, locally known as “the brains,” and the cluster of rockets were also created by a team of 12 peasants.

“It’s nice here, I don’t want to leave,” Polissky says of his work. “I like the fact that the wind is constantly blowing here. And we, the people here, epitomize this intelligence.”

Visitors at the opening of the Universal Mind project by Nikolai Polissky in Nikola-Lenivets.

When the festival began in the evening, the Universal Mind was practically transformed into a spaceship, as music and lighting came on and the whole of Nikola-Lenivets turned into a unified art platform for musical and light performances.

The opening ceremony featured the British electronic band The ORB. The Universal Mind, which acted as the venue for the performance, changed colors from crimson, to yellow, to pale blue, shot colored rays of light into the sky and looked like it was about to take off into space with its cluster of lit-up rockets.