Custo

The history of this project began, of course, much earlier, but it got finally formed exactly in 2002. That was in Australia. Anya Kopeykina and Dima Gurovitch actively used an art-friendly atmosphere in different ways. The first result of their work was playing on basins, other objects and on rooms at all. A woman who lived upstairs enjoyed it very much. “Next-floor-neighbours” is a very special definition for the history of Custo project at all. A role of a thankful listener was usually played by lonely women of different ages who had lived on the floor above.

After a while Custo’s creative attention moved from basins to computer software ⁠— graphical and musical. Programs helped Anya and Dima to speak their native language of art much louder without disfiguring their creative output.

Both audio and visual parts are important as Custo is an audiovisual project. The sound and the picture are two parts of a single whole.

The title of the collective was chosen in honor of Jacques-Yves Cousteau (it is not obvious, but some similarity can be found in the pronunciation), a famous ecologist, filmmaker and researcher who studied the sea and all forms of life in water. Water is almost a natural environment for Anya and Dima where they feel themselves comfortable. Different exercises with this element of nature (diving, surf-riding, etc.) take a big part of their lives and leave a bright impressions too, of course.

They refuse to speak about jazz and state “jazz is my religion”. It is obvious that jazz is necessary for Custo, no less than computers, traveling or water.