Gregory Orekhov: SoftPower is a visual allusion to sandbags — objects deeply rooted in the imagery of war zones and natural disasters. Typically used for urgent protection and defense, they symbolize fear, pressure, and resistance. But in this work, they are stripped of weight. Instead of sand — air. Instead of threat —silence.
These pillow-like forms, stacked in a circle, do not create a fortification, but rather a space for stillness and retreat. Not a barricade, but a temporary sanctuary. The work transforms a symbol of fear and defense into a metaphor for fragile yet resilient inner strength.
SoftPower speaks to the need to defend ourselves not with weapons, but with culture. It is an attempt to protect not with a wall, but with a gesture — delicate, silent, yet full of meaning. France was chosen as the site of the project for a reason. It is one of the few countries that has long projected its cultural identity across the world, using precisely the tools of soft power. In this sense, the work becomes a dialogue — with place, with tradition, with the history of influence.
SoftPower invites the viewer to enter a fragile monument. It is an architecture not of power, but of silence. Not of closure, but of concentration. A work about how art can become a form of protection — not from the world, but for it.
