Divided line analogy

As images multiply and AI changes our understanding of the original, how do self-reproduction and the creation of copies of ourselves affect the role of art?

Today, when images, texts, and interpretations can be reproduced and copied with ease, the question of authenticity in art once again becomes essential. On March 26, Stella Art Foundation opens Dmitry Shorin’s exhibition Divided Line Analogy — a project that registers this shift and invites us to see the copy not as a substitute but as a way of experiencing reality in an age of reflections, replication, and artificial intelligence.

As people increasingly encounter their own images — in selfies, portraits, reflections, and digital avatars — copying ceases to be merely a technical operation. It becomes a social and cultural mechanism through which we repeatedly affirm our presence in the world. Endless self-reproduction becomes a way to reassure ourselves of our own reality and to record it amid a stream of events and images.

The project’s title draws on the analogies in Plato’s Republic and refers to the principle of likeness without identity. Here, an analogy is understood as a copy that does not fully reproduce the original but relates to it through recognizable features. The “divided line” becomes a metaphor for reflection: projecting oneself outward in order to connect with the real world. The copy becomes an act of self-assertion in which exact correspondence loses its decisive importance and distortions acquire meaning of their own.

Historically, reflection has been associated not only with self-knowledge but also with attempts to look into the future — from divination with mirrors and symmetrical inkblots to today’s predictive algorithms. AI applications increasingly take on this function: dialogue with a machine that reflects our words, fears, and expectations becomes a new mirror of consciousness and part of how we understand and construct reality. These copies — painted, reproduced, and digital — do not diminish the value of the original; on the contrary, they emphasize it. In a world of automatic reproduction, handwork, traces of the body, and imperfections of form are increasingly perceived as evidence of human presence. At this point, authenticity is determined not only by the object itself but also by the viewer’s stance toward it.

Divided Line Analogy becomes a space for a public gesture — an attempt to capture a moment in which each of us must answer anew the question of what to trust: technology, art, or our own image.

The exhibition will feature new works from the Divided Line Analogy series, works from private collections, and a separate room devoted to the artist’s most significant pieces. On April 22, the exhibition will host the presentation of Shorin Art Foundation and a special program for collectors.