Leonid Voitsekhov is a contemporary artist, art theorist, curator and writer. He was born and lived almost all his life in Odesa. He is a father of Odesa Conceptualism – a trend of art that claims that the main thing is not the form of the work, but its intellectual component. Most of Voitsekhov’s works are built on associations, wordplay and absurd situations that force the viewer to pay attention to non-obvious details. He was one of the first organizers of actions and performances in Odesa.

In the performance “By the way” Leonid Voitsekhov sits on a tree stump, surrounded by sheets of paper with the text “Mezhdu protchim” (By the way) written on them. The sheets are arranged in a circle around him. At some point, the author placed sheets of paper with the text “By the way” in English around him. The artist is dressed in simple clothes, his posture is calm and focused. People are constantly walking around him, but their faces are not visible due to the lack of focus on them. Only their legs are visible, which periodically appear and disappear in the frame.

As you know, the phrase “By the way” is often used to introduce additional, non-main details. From the point of view of strangers passing by, Voitsekhov was among other insignificant details for them. Those who have stopped to look at him are not visible. No one was interested in the sheets scattered on the floor either. On the other hand, for the artist, these people are also not essential and surround him as much ” By the way” as the sheets with the inscriptions. That is why there are no faces of people passing by in the photo documentation of the performance – they are not important. But, probably, the artist’s indifference to those around him is not sincere. After all, it was not for nothing that he replaced the leaflets with an appeal in Russian for similar ones with an English phrase. He is probably trying to be understood by others and would not mind being noticed. In this way, the performance demonstrates the intersection between personal and general, significant and the insignificant, and has at its core simplicity and irony at the same time. The performance touches important ethical problems connected with the lack of mutual understanding between members of society and the importance for society of every person, no matter how insignificant.