Time of the Phoenix examines the early stages of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine through a series of photographs that foreground the psychological and spiritual experiences of Ukrainians—dimensions often omitted from conventional representations of war. Created during the artist’s journeys across diverse regions of her native country, the work investigates themes of collective adaptation, resilience, and the evolving constructs of home and belonging.
It further engages with the altered states of consciousness that emerge in response to trauma, shaped by the body’s biochemical reaction to persistent threat and violence. Amidst this turmoil, the project also traces the pursuit of joy and a semblance of normalcy, expressed in moments that hover between the naive, the surreal, and the grotesque.
The title references the poem Time of the Phoenix by Rose Ausländer, a Jewish poet who, like Lupu, emigrated from Ukraine to New York. The work invokes the metaphor of transfiguration through fire—an emblem of communal transformation in the face of uncertainty and existential rupture.