MICROCOSMOS

Ukrainian artist Daria Pugachova has sent the dreams of an entire community into outer space through the Xu Bing Space Art Residency Program. The community portraits created just before the full-scale invasion have thus been transformed into a cosmic gesture of hope, memory, and resilience.

This satellite-based work continues Pugachova’s acclaimed documentary MICROCOSMOS. Filmed in late 2021, the documentary captures life in Polovky, a post-Soviet neighborhood in Poltava, Ukraine. 

In the film, Pugachova roams the courtyards dressed as an astronaut, talking with residents about their dreams, their lives, and their childhood memories spent in these yards. After these encounters, she performed at the local stadium, symbolically “launching” their dreams into space. What began as an intimate, poetic exploration of a neighborhood unexpectedly became a precious time capsule—capturing the final moments of peace before the outbreak of war.

During filming, Pugachova made a promise to the residents:
“Tell me your dream—I will launch it into the sky.”

In 2025, that promise was fulfilled.

As part of the Xu Bing Space Art Residency Program, Pugachova sent the video recordings and spoken dreams of the Polovky community into Earth’s orbit. These digital “dream archives” were played on the SCA-2 Art Satellite, traveling through space while carrying the voices and wishes of Ukrainians whose lives were forever altered by war.

“After four years of destruction, displacement, and shattered dreams, I want to show that DREAM cannot be destroyed,” says Pugachova. “If the dreams of one small Ukrainian neighborhood can reach space, then there is hope for all of us.”