Dmytro Erlich’s video “Pigeons” lasts three minutes and a few seconds.During this time we fly through the hanged pigeons, which sway sometimes sharply, sometimes gently accompanied with sounds of Mozart’s Requiem and holding twigs of peace in their beaks.
You can think that pigeons hang in groups – at some point two or three are very close to us, we fly past them and after a few bars of music we see another group in the distance. And so it repeats many times. All pigeons are alike.

These are not authentic Doves of Peace. They resemble Pablo Picasso’s birds only with the twigs in their beaks. But Picasso’s doves carry branches of an olive tree according to the Bible, and Ehrlich’s birds have branches of Odesa acacia. And the pigeons of Odesa artist themselves resemble pigeons only with a head with a beak and red paws. The body of our pigeon is completely human – a timid, slightly stooped man with a raised left shoulder. He is dressed in a long coat made of boards like a coffin. Probably, before hanging, he was caught with a net over his head and hanged with it. The same net protrudes from the right pocket.

The symbolism of this work collides peace and innocence, traditionally associated with the image of doves with cruelty and death, conveyed through the act of hanging. Dmytro Erlich debunks idealistic ideas about peace and hope. The legend invented by the communists that all nations always want peace and wars are fought only by bloody imperialist dictators on their own is unfortunately not true. The author’s objects are messengers of the Peace that did not happen. The dove, which has always been associated with peace, turns into a metaphor for the collapse of illusions and hopes. The work brings to mind the constant conflict between ideal and reality.