Too Many Dragonflies, or the Birth of Venus

This artistic research project examines the decision some women are making today—to voluntarily serve in the armed forces—and considers how this choice can be represented within contemporary and historical contexts, in Ukraine and beyond.

Too Many Dragonflies, or the Birth of Venus is an ongoing artistic research project by Ira Lupu. The project examines the decision some women are making today—to voluntarily serve in the armed forces—and considers how this choice can be represented within contemporary and historical contexts, in Ukraine and beyond.

Developed during a three-week stay at a military camp and on the front line in the Kharkiv region, the work focuses on a group of women serving side by side within the same unit. The photographs trace the spectrum of military life: everyday routines and moments of rest by a lake, psychological testing, UAV training, and combat deployments carried out under the constant presence of drone swarms.

A swarm of dragonflies encountered near one of the outposts becomes the project’s central metaphor—a fragile yet persistent presence. The work juxtaposes two swarm logics—organic and technological, delicate and lethal—coexisting within the same sky.

Documentary observation is interwoven with the artist’s notes from Lacanian psychoanalytic sessions reflecting on her first combat experience—the psychological shift of becoming a potential target—alongside fragments of dreams, interviews, and intimate rituals of everyday self-care.

Including both Ukrainian service members and Colombian women who have traveled to fight on Ukraine’s side, the project reflects the increasingly international character of the war while approaching its protagonists as individuals navigating radical transformation.

Resisting visual sensationalism, Too Many Dragonflies employs empathy as a method—an attempt to consider how identity and femininity are reshaped in close proximity to violence.

The application includes an outtake from the upcoming zine designed by Xenia Havrylova.

The protagonists’ call signs: Gorgona, Somatra, Aphrodita, Jinx, Mei Mei, Sol’, Kostyl, Zhuyka, Malina, Yazva, Migraine, Cap, Simka, Diamante, Sikha, Cloe, Dariia Vasylivna, Alla, Valentyna, Alyona, Inna, and Valeriia