Video

«I continue to lift the stones I threw first. Now I am in your place too.» In this performance, I gather stones — symbols of judgment and accusation, referencing the biblical quote: «Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.» Having faced these «stones» myself, I express repentance through the act of lifting them, reflecting a process of acceptance and rethinking my own vulnerability. ©AnaZhukArt 2026

“Do not turn around. Burning and blazing on the hill — Sodom and Gomorrah. Lot’s wife would not have looked back twice.” At the core of this artwork is the theme of profound loss and a radical refusal to look back. Sodom and Gomorrah serve as a metaphor for personal catastrophe and total disillusionment. To look back at what has been scorched is to condemn oneself to mental petrification, turning into a pillar of salt made of grief. The figure on the hill, with her back turned, chooses self-preservation. The mirror in her hands reflects no ruins, only an empty, clear sky. By refusing to look back, she does not lose the past — she reclaims her future. ©AnaZhukArt 2026

“The earth punishes for a lost connection with oneself. I nurtured another’s crop, I only vaguely remember my own stacks. Standing in an empty field.” In the biblical tradition, harvest is not only the gathering of crops but also a time when a person’s true character is revealed, when the fruits of their labor and faith are collected. The harvest becomes a symbol of the heart’s trial and the responsibility for what has been sown in the soul. This video is a metaphorical reflection of an inner state that has lost connection with itself — but harvest time is always an opportunity to rethink oneself, restore the connection with the inner world, and begin a new cycle of growth. ©AnaZhukArt 2026

Water is a universal solvent that washes away external dirt. From a chemical standpoint, it breaks any bonds. If there is anyone worth forgiving, forgive yourself — “…and you shall be whiter than snow” (Ps. 51:7). ©AnaZhukArt 2026

Repetition and routine serve as both a support system and a pathway to achieving goals, yet at the same time they become a limitation for the body and mind — triggering anxiety and a sense of having no choice. The video work is built around my daily route to the supermarket and back, a path so habitual it has become automatic. Two parallel video sequences offer views from both inside and outside. «If you undress and lie down on the ground, you can feel how deeply it knows how to love. Yesterday, the sky kissed me — you can tell by my sunburned face. I see these days imprinted on my body: bruises, scrapes, scratches — it hurts to step on my heel because of the wounds. But I don’t remember how it happened. There was no pain or fear in the moment.» ©AnaZhukArt 2026

A path — seemingly monotonous, yet always different. It begins with “leaving the house” and walking towards nowhere. ©AnaZhukArt 2026

Visuals & Editing - Ana Zhuk Music - DEAD SELF Music - Brett Sanders ©AnaZhukArt 2026 This video was created in a place where there was not a single other person. It felt like the edge of the world—only wild horses, the wind, and vast water. I spent a week there in complete solitude. Living in rhythm with nature, moving through the landscape naked, observing, and slowly returning to the wildness that exists within each of us. For me, this work is an exploration of our primal nature, the memory of the body, and a state that exists before social roles and constructed identities. It is an attempt to encounter the part of myself that remains unchanged beneath the layers of culture, expectation, and identity. This is not a story about solitude. It is a story about returning.

Visuals & Editing - Ana Zhuk Music - DEAD SELF Music & Lyrics - Brett Sanders ©AnaZhukArt 2026 ERASE ME I NEED SOMETHING FOR YOUR TOUCH FOR YOUR LOVE I’M NOTHING WITHOUT YOU AND YOUR LOVE GIVE ME NOW ALL YOU’VE GOT MY DEAR AND I LOVE YOU SO MUCH SO MUCH AND YOU ACT LIKE IT’S SOMETHING WHEN IT’S NOT THIS IS NOTHING TO ME ERASE ME ERASE ME YOU THINK THIS IS SOMETHING THAT IT’S NOT YOU THINK ABOUT ME WHEN YOU’RE ALONE IN YOUR MIND IN YOUR HEART I DON’T CARE YOU’RE NOT MUCH ERASE ME ERASE ME ERASE ME ERASE ME I DON’T CARE IT’S NOT MUCH This work explores a state of self-erasure in which identity, desire, and emotional attachment dissolve into a process of disintegration. A human figure moves within a minimal space. The body gradually covers itself with clay, turning movement into a slow continuous process that oscillates between gesture and disappearance. The figure does not aim at representation; instead, it appears to return to a material state, merging with the substance that covers it. The text intensifies this condition. It shifts between longing, dependency, rejection, and negation, repeating the imperative “erase me” as both demand and refusal. Desire here is unstable: at once absolute and empty, erasing the boundary between closeness and disappearance. In this process of movement, the body ceases to function as a psychological subject. It becomes a surface of transformation, where expression dissolves into matter. The gestures resemble an act of self-erasure, in which the distinction between body and substance, subject and form, gradually disappears. The work does not resolve this tension. It remains within it—between attachment and erasure, presence and disappearance, voice and silence.

Visuals & Editing - Ana Zhuk Music - DEAD SELF Music & Lyrics - Brett Sanders ©AnaZhukArt 2026 HOW DO YOU SLEEP WHY? WHEN? DO YOU SAY? HOW DO YOU SLEEP WITH YOURSELF? WHEN DO YOU SAY IT’S TOO MUCH? GO DOWN IN YOURSELF IN THE DEPTHS OF YOURSELF I’VE SEEN IT I’VE SEEN IT I’VE SEEN IT IN YOUR FACE LISTEN ALONE TO YOUR SILENCE LISTEN ALONE TO YOUR SILENCE WHY DO YOU FEEL THE NEED TO LET GO? WHY DO YOU FEEL THE NEED TO STAY CALM? WHEN WILL YOU STAY? HI. WHEN WILL YOU SAY? ENOUGH I DON’T SEE THE WAY DOWN I DON’T SEE THE WAY OUT LISTEN ALONE TO THE SOUND LISTEN ALONE TO YOUR VOICE This work observes abandoned architectural structures through continuous movement. Empty buildings, overgrown facades, and unfinished constructions appear one after another, suspended between permanence and disappearance. The camera does not stop to document them as ruins; instead, it passes by, allowing the architecture to unfold as a sequence of fragments. Detached from their original purpose, these spaces become carriers of absence. Nature slowly reclaims what was built, while traces of human presence remain embedded in concrete, metal, and empty interiors. The work lingers in the tension between what endures and what quietly fades from use. The accompanying song introduces a voice that asks questions without expecting answers. Rather than illustrating the images, it transforms the landscape into an introspective space where silence becomes an active presence. The abandoned structures begin to resemble states of mind—places where memory, isolation, and reflection coexist. The work explores architecture not as an object, but as a psychological landscape. Moving through these spaces becomes a way of encountering what remains after activity has ceased, inviting the viewer to consider silence not as emptiness, but as a condition in which hidden questions begin to surface.

Visuals & Editing - Ana Zhuk Music - DEAD SELF Music & Lyrics - Brett Sanders ©AnaZhukArt 2026 DOWN HERE I DON’T SEE HOW YOU SAY YOU MIGHT CARE UNDERGROUND I DON’T FEEL I AM YOU DOWN HERE LET GO TO THE GROUND TO THE EARTH MY PLACE WHERE IT GROWS WHERE IT FLOWS OUT OF ME IN MY PLACE This work explores the human figure as a form stripped of individual content and narrative definition. Sculptural bodies appear in the frame at varying distances—both close and far—as fixed, immobile structures. The camera does not attempt to animate or interpret them, but instead records their presence as material fact. The viewer moves among these figures, attempting to look inside each form in search of a living presence, an inner content, or traces of individuality. Yet this search finds no answer: there is no hidden layer, no internal narrative—only form sustaining itself as surface. In this repeated act of looking, the very idea of the figure as a carrier of an inner “self” gradually begins to dissolve. The accompanying sound intensifies this tension, introducing motifs of disconnection, dissolution, and downward movement—“into the ground” or “beneath the surface.” These motifs do not explain the image, but instead strip away expectations of meaning, leaving a pure structure of presence. The work does not propose an interpretation of the figure as subject. It holds a state in which the human becomes an observable form without access to an inner content.

Visuals & Editing - Ana Zhuk Music - DEAD SELF Music & Lyrics - Brett Sanders ©AnaZhukArt 2026 SOUND OF THE FALL SOUND OF THE FALL DEATH FALLING LEAVES CRASH WILL I GO? WHEN I LEAVE? I CAN’T FEEL YOU PLEASE … SOUND OF THE FALL I HEAR A VOICE FELT THE CRASH LET ME GO I FELT THE CRASH BLOOD ON MY FACE GLASS IN MY EYES I CANT SEE YOU FEEL YOUR MIND FEEL YOUR TOUCH WHERE ARE YOU I NEED YOUR TOUCH PLEASE LIFT THE WINGS… This work unfolds as a ritual action existing outside a specific time and place. In a nocturnal landscape, a female figure moves between a tree, sand, and fire. The repetitive performative gestures do not form a narrative and do not lead to resolution. Instead, they exist as a way of inhabiting an internal state that cannot be precisely articulated. The work creates an emotional field through the presence of sound. Images of falling, death, and loss do not function as descriptions of a specific event, but rather as an experience of an inner rupture—a moment in which a stable sense of self begins to dissolve. Falling here is not an ending, but a passage beyond previous forms of existence and an encounter with the unknown. The naked body is not presented as an object of the gaze. It appears as a figure of radical openness, freed from social roles and everyday definitions. Its presence emphasizes not physical form, but the condition of being alone with one’s own experience. The work does not refer to any specific religious tradition, but draws on the universal language of ritual. Fire, tree, darkness, and repetitive gesture construct a space in which inner experience becomes visible not through narration, but through presence.

Visuals & Editing - Ana Zhuk Music - DEAD SELF Music & Lyrics - Brett Sanders ©AnaZhukArt 2026 IS IT REAL / ONLY SKY HOW DO I KNOW WHAT’S REAL IN THIS PLACE? …THEY SAY IT’S REAL I DON’T SEE ANY CLOUDS IN THE SKY … JUST HAVE FAITH I BELIVE MY HAND CAN TOUCH … MUST BELIEVE I BELIEVE I SEE YOU WITH A FACE … THE DEAD SELF ARE YOU REAL? … ONLY SKY CAN WE TOUCH IN THE PLACE WITH NO CLOUDS ONLY SKY This work explores the symbolic death of the ego as an internal ritual of transition, in which the subject simultaneously witnesses and enacts its own disappearance. A female figure is positioned by the water in a state of awakening, as if suspended between two conditions—presence and completion. She begins to construct a ritual space around herself, gathering elements from the landscape and placing them onto her body, as though preparing it for burial. This gesture is not literal, but exists as an internal procedure of separation from the self. The process unfolds as a gradual dissolution of a former identity. The figure does not simply vanish physically; rather, she progressively relinquishes the stable form of the “I,” allowing it to disintegrate within an act that is both experienced and performed. The accompanying song intensifies this state, creating tension between faith and doubt, between the need for perceptual grounding and its collapse. The image of a “sky without clouds” becomes a space in which familiar reference points disappear, leaving only a pure, undefined form of presence. The work does not depict death as an event, but instead considers it as a process of transformation of consciousness—a moment in which the “self” ceases to function as a fixed point and becomes a fluid state passing through its own disappearance.

Visuals & Editing - Ana Zhuk Music - DEAD SELF Music & Lyrics - Brett Sanders ©AnaZhukArt 2026 love insane i wanted to feel love touch lying on the floor to feel i wonder where you are nothing when say: “go” “enough” …nothing This work explores an encounter with that which remains invisible and resists explanation. A female figure inhabits an open landscape. She lies on the ground, touches the earth, and performs a series of repetitive gestures that resemble a ritual. These actions have no defined purpose and lead to no resolution. Instead, they exist as a form of reaching toward something that cannot be seen directly or expressed through language. The accompanying song provides the work’s inner direction. Love is understood here not as a feeling directed toward another person, but as a state of complete surrender to something greater—one that may arise from despair, uncertainty, and the inability to find one’s place in the world. This impulse to move beyond individual experience becomes an attempt to approach what remains unseen and beyond explanation. The work does not refer to any specific religious tradition, but draws on the universal language of ritual as a form of seeking. The repeated gesture does not promise revelation or resolution. Instead, it becomes a way of encountering what already exists within us yet often remains hidden from view—a quiet acceptance of this unseen part of ourselves, without the need to fully understand or define it.

Visuals & Editing - Ana Zhuk Music - DEAD SELF Music & Lyrics - Brett Sanders ©AnaZhukArt 2026 Lyrics: WAVES I’m going to fall Like a wave Like the sound I could feel you through the wave Through your sound I think I could fly Like a wave Passing sound I’d like to fall in your arms Like a wave As it crashes around So could it be Are you here ? I can’t feel you Are you here ? I hear the waves crashing Onto my face Erase the lines That separate this place That hold you in line That separate space I hear the waves crashing All on my face I love the waves to smash me Erase me From this place Erase the lines I’m going to fall This video explores the fragile boundary between body, memory, and landscape. Filmed in an open field, the work follows a solitary figure moving through fog, where the surrounding environment gradually ceases to function as a backdrop and becomes an extension of an inner state. Gestures repeat without resolution, the face is partially concealed, and the landscape absorbs the body rather than framing it. The work emerged from an experience of finding a place that briefly felt like home, only to discover that the sense of belonging had been built upon deception. Rather than narrating this event directly, the video considers what remains after such a rupture: when a place continues to exist, yet no longer carries the meaning once attached to it. The accompanying song speaks of waves erasing boundaries. This image became central to the work—not as a metaphor for water, but for memory itself. Memory moves in cycles, returning in fragments, dissolving the lines between presence and absence, self and place, past and present. The landscape does not witness the loss; it quietly continues to exist. Within this indifference, the work asks whether a place can remain home after the story attached to it has disappeared.

Visuals & Editing - Ana Zhuk Music - DEAD SELF Music & Lyrics - Brett Sanders ©AnaZhukArt 2026 waiting i see the world from the clouds it’s nice i see my life from above i know i can feel all the love i can be who i am how do they know what i am? how can they see through my eyes? blue sky into the deep clouds envelop me they say you are a bird i knew since i was a child i had a calling something more my real name i am the world This work unfolds as a continuous act of walking. A solitary figure, seen only from behind, moves through architectural spaces that gradually shape the rhythm and direction of his journey. Buildings, corridors, and open passages become more than a setting—they define the experience of movement itself. As the journey progresses, the built environment slowly gives way to an open landscape. The path ends at the water, where movement comes to a halt. Rather than offering a conclusion, this moment opens a space for contemplation, where the destination becomes less important than the transformation that occurs along the way. The accompanying song extends this physical journey into an inner one. Its imagery of clouds, sky, and flight suggests a shift in perspective—a way of seeing the world beyond fixed identities and familiar structures. Questions of selfhood remain unresolved, gradually dissolving into a broader sense of connection with the surrounding world. The work explores movement as a passage between different states of being. Architecture, the road, and the water form a sequence of thresholds through which the figure passes, revealing not a destination, but a changing relationship between body, space, and perception.