“Ouranophobia 03127”: Abbas Zahedi Presents a Sound Project on Memory and Loss in Kyiv
On August 20, British artist Abbas Zahedi presented Ouranophobia 03127 at the Pavilion of Culture in Kyiv. The sound work is a Kyiv continuation of Ouranophobia 47051, an installation created for Manifesta 16 Ruhr and presented at the Kulturkirche Liebfrauen in Duisburg.
Abbas Zahedi is a British artist working across sound, installation, and performance. His practice often explores care, loss, collective memory, and ways of living together in the aftermath of traumatic events.
At the heart of the project are organ pipes separated from the instruments they once belonged to. Among them are fragments of the Rieger-Kloss organ from St. Nicholas Church in Kyiv, which was damaged by fire in 2021. Rather than reconstructing the destroyed instrument, Zahedi incorporates the old pipes into a new sound system, where air, mechanics, and electronics give them a new voice.
The title Ouranophobia means “fear of the sky.” Within the work, the sky takes on a double meaning: traditionally associated with spirituality and prayer, it can also become a potential source of danger through the experience of war. Organ pipes — objects closely connected with sacred spaces — are therefore placed somewhere between memory, destruction, and the possibility of a new existence.
The numbers 03127 and 47051 are the postal codes of Kyiv and Duisburg. They emphasize the project’s geography: physical fragments from Kyiv become part of an installation in Germany, while its sound-based continuation returns to Kyiv.
Ouranophobia does not attempt to return damaged objects to their original state. Instead, Zahedi proposes another possibility: something that has lost its former function can acquire a new voice and a new context.
Text: Yanina Provotar
Photos: Juliia Brosko
