Olga Lisovska, an artist and illustrator from Kharkiv, is the 2021 winner of OPEN CALL at ART basement. To create her works she usually uses watercolors and felt-tip pens. 

The author’s take on the concept:

“… All the graphic works presented in this exhibition have been made in less than a year, from June 2020 till now. These are very different things both stylistically and technically, but they have one thing in common: my love for everyday and stupid things. All those moments which you rarely notice but which do not deserve to be forgotten. My main goal is to convey that fleeting impression, literally the visual diary of a person with a leaky memory.

I regularly practice doing quick sketches to grab and convey the sharpest and most interesting essense of what you are drawing in a few minutes. This is great for training your skill to look and see, which is important not only for artists in their work, but as a life skill in general.

We are very fragile folks, and the best way to maintain mental health amid a pandemic, crises, pebbles in a shoe and sudden inevitable deadlines is to look around and notice beauty every day – in a morning coffee, in a funny hat on an elderly lady approaching you, or in memes with toads … “