A few weeks ago, MTO visited the Ukrainian capital to take part in the ongoing Art United Us (see our coverage of other murals) project curated by Iryna Kanishcheva and Geo Leros. During his stay, he painted a large elaborate mural inspired by the unprecedented hack of Ukraine’s power grid last December.
With his recent work, the French artist is including the events from the cyber world into his imagery while creating sort of a reality glitch. This particular piece was his visual representation of the hacker attack that left 230,000 Ukrainian residents in the dark. The well prepared and carefully planned assault by the skilled and stealthy figures resulted in a synchronized attack that set an ominous precedent for the safety and security of power grids everywhere. Titled From Russia With Love, the digital love-cannonball sent from Moscow (Russia) to Kiev (Ukraine) represents the love / hate relationship between the two countries, but also serves as a reminder of our dependence on electricity and other power sources. In order to depict the cyber world and represent the strength of this attack, MTO painted over 2,000 fake tiles and fake windows creating an illusion, sort of virtual reality background for his main image.
