Oleksandr Roitburd is a well-known Ukrainian artist and curator. He was born in 1961 in Odesa. One of the leaders of the Ukrainian trans-avant-garde. Author of interesting series of paintings on various social, historical, religious and general cultural topics. He is also known as the author of video art. He always led an active social life, had a prominent patriotic attitude. At the end of his life, he became a deputy of the Odesa Regional Council and was elected as a director of the Odesa National Fine Arts Museum. In a short time, he managed to turn the museum into a contemporary art institution.

Oleksandr Roitburd’s video “The Psychedelic Invasion of the Battleship Potemkin into the Tautological Hallucinosis of Sergei Eisenstein” presents an actual look at the famous film by Sergei Eisenstein ” the Battleship Potemkin”. Eisenstein dedicated the main part of the film to the scene of the Odesans execution by the tsarist soldiers on the Grand Staircase. This scene was his complete invention, but the frames of this non-existent story are recognized as one of the best in world cinematography.

Roitburd re-edited the footage of the film and added modern scenes to them. The video begins with a man wearing a monkey mask sitting on the stairs and playing the violin. On the stairs joyful Odesans from the past and from the present are standing, who wave their hands and greet everyone. This scene serves as a bridge between different eras. On the stairs from Eisenstein’s film there appear: a figure with stumps of legs and ladies with an umbrella and a lorgnette, who kindly wave to someone. Present time people also hug and kiss. Among them is the author of the video. All frames are repeated three or four times. Excessive joy gives the whole scene a comic quality.

Suddenly, the shooting begins. A man with a monkey’s head falls from the stairs, boys on roller skates fall either. Other present time characters also scream in terror and fall. People in the film run down, not paying attention to those who have already fallen. We may also see legendary characters: a pram rolling down the stairs, a murdered child and a woman carrying it, a murdered woman in pince-nez, a man crushed by running people, many classic tragic film shots that become their opposite through multiplied repetitions. After that, it is impossible to believe Eisenschein’s film.

The video ends with Roitburd finishing his game on the violin and falling down shot.