Kateryna Botanova is a Ukrainian cultural critic, curator, and writer based in Basel, Switzerland. She is a co-curator of CULTURESCAPES, a Swiss multidisciplinary biennial, and an editor of the critical anthologies that accompany each festival, among them Culturescapes 2021 Amazonia: Anthology as Cosmology; On the Edge: Culturescapes 2019 Poland; Culturescapes 2023: Sahara (upcoming). 

Kateryna was also a director of CSM/Foundation Center for Contemporary Art in Kyiv, where, in 2010, she launched and edited Korydor, the online journal on contemporary culture. She has worked extensively with EU Eastern Partnership Culture Program and EUNIC Global as a consultant and expert. 

A member of PEN Ukraine, she publishes widely on arts and culture.  Recently, Kateryna’s essays and articles appeared in Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Eurozine, Osteuropa, Various Artists, Dwutygodnik, Tagesspiegel, Atlantic Council, and more. Her essays have been included in Contemporary Ukrainian and Baltic Art. Political and Social Perspectives, 1991–2021. Ibidem, 2021; Future We Are Longing For. Tempora, 2020; Bridges Not Walls: What Unites Ukrainians. VSL, 2020. More to read here linktr.ee/kbotanova

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Photo by Bettina Matthiessen for Culturescapes

Lia Dostlieva is an artist, cultural anthropologist, and essayist who works across a range of media, including photography, installation, and textile sculptures. Lia’s artistic and research practice engages with the issues of collective trauma, Anthropocene, decoloniality, and the agency of vulnerable groups. She has exhibited work at the Ludwig Museum (Budapest, Hungary), National Gallery of Art (Vilnius, Lithuania), Tbilisi Photography and Multimedia Museum (Tbilisi, Sakartvelo), National Museum of Fine Arts (Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan), Latvian National Museum of Art (Riga, Latvia). Her curatorial projects include the 10th Triennale of Young Polish Art (Centre of Polish Sculpture in Orońsko, Poland, 2023) and ‘Reconstruction of Memory’ (DOX, Prague, Czech Republic, 2017; IZOLYATSIA, Kyiv, Ukraine 2016). In 2022-23, she was a participant of the Jan van Eyck Academie (Maastricht, Netherlands) and a 2019 Visiting Fellow of the Institute for Human Sciences (Vienna, Austria). Lia also writes for publications, including e-flux Journal, Eurozine magazine, Kajet Journal, and Blok Magazine. Originally from Donetsk, Ukraine, Lia is currently in Poznan, Poland.

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Lizaveta German is a curator and researcher with a PhD in art history. She has been a part of an independent curatorial collective with Maria Lanko since 2013. In collaboration with Maria Lanko and Borys Filonenko, Lizaveta co-curated Fountain of Exhaustion, the project by Pavlo Makov presented at the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 59th La Biennale di Venezia in 2022. (The Art Margins interview with Maria about her journey to evacuate the artwork for the Biennale at the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine.)

Lizaveta was a guest curator at the Liverpool Biennial (2016, UK). She co-edited the books The Art of the Ukrainian Sixties and Decommunized: Ukrainian Soviet Mosaics, contributed to the educational websites Cultural Project and Sense, and lectured on Contemporary Art at Kyiv Academy of Media Arts.

During the Art Prospect residency, German gave lectures on the history and theory of curation, lead a series of workshops on curating and preparing art projects (the basics of curatorial research, guidelines for putting together a display and writing wall texts, conventions of interacting with artists), and served as a consultant for ArtEast students’ final exhibition. German visited studios and local art institutions. She also studied museum collections in Bishkek and nearby cities as part of research for a book about the history of curation in Ukraine and other former Soviet countries.

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Embracing ideas of consumption, gender, love, power, protest culture, experience of war, plants and dogs, Alevtina Kakhidze is co-founder of a residency program for international artists in the village of Muzychi, The Muzychi Expanded History Project.

To raise awareness of climate change and more sustainable living in the era of global shifts in society, especially in post-pandemic times, she has initiated the laboratory Adult Garden to observe coexistence and the dynamics of plants freed from the gardener’s intervention.

During her ArtsLink International Fellowship 2020 (virtual and in-person residencies), Alevtina and her US collaborators embarked on a garden-focused project that centers on critical observation of organized experimental gardens and natural conservation areas. The artists and scientists from University of Kansas studied the competition and collaboration observable among plants and between plants and living organisms such as insects and birds.  Studies focused on the interaction between native and non-native (including invasive) plants, and explored the cases when a plant native to the US became invasive in Ukraine and vice versa. Alevtina also studied traditional Native American practices of gardening and medicinal plant use.

In Alevtina’s third year of ArtsLink International Fellowship in 2022, she is planning a collaboration with the Kansas University School of Visual Art on the project ‘Fate of Plants’. She will continue to research stable systems – prairies in Kansas, a steppe in Ukraine and the restored plant systems on the edge of the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone – to generate new work, a series of texts for art and scientific publications and an online discussion. The project has been postponed until the end of war in Ukraine.

The artist profile in the Burlington Contemporary magazine, July 27, 2022
“With the Russian invasion in February 2022, Kakhidze’s art became more radical. Her critique of the war continues to be enacted through a personal lens, however her anti-colonialist narratives are more explicit and her reference points are wider, articulating the violence and imminent danger that characterize life for so many in Ukraine.” (Svitlana Biedarieva, Burlington Contemporary, July 27, 2022)

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Yulia Kostereva is an artist and curator. Originally from Kyiv, Ukraine, after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Yulia relocated to Warsaw, Poland, where she coordinated the Emergency Residencies program to support cultural workers seeking refuge from the war. Currently, Yulia manages the program Сильні Разом/Strong Together implemented by the Arsenal Gallery in Białystok, and the Open Place platform of interdisciplinary practices within the framework of Culture Helps/Культура допомагає project.

Yulia works with installations, objects and joint actions, history and stories related to a place, an object or a person. Her practice encompasses visual arts and the art of interaction.

Together with the artist Yuriy Kruchak, Yulia co-founded the art platform Open Place which has been operating in Kyiv since 1999. She studied at the theatre stage design department of the Kharkiv State Art School, the graphics department of the Kharkiv Art and Industrial Institute, and the graphics department of the National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture.

Yuriy Kruchak is an artist whose professional interests include interdisciplinary and post‑artistic practices, intensification of connections between the artistic process and various strata of modern society. He works on the fringes between art and social studies, and his practice addresses the relationship of art to reality , with a special focus on the relationship of the artist to the audience. Yuriy also works as a curator and organizer. He is a co-founder of the interdisciplinary platform Open Place in Kyiv, Ukraine.

Yuriy’s artistic strategies depend on a specific issue and often engage different communities in the creative process. His works in public spaces transform the audience into the actors, creating a community whose behavior and interaction serves to interpret and reveal social structures in an urban environment.

Yuriy studied Scenography at Kharkiv State Art College (1989 -1991), Environmental design at the Kharkiv art-industrial institute (currently Kharkiv State academy of Design and Arts) (1991-1996). He received a Master degree in Painting from the National Academy of Fine Art and Architecture in Kyiv (1999). Got the scholarship Gaude Polonia (National Center for Culture Poland) in 2018.

Anton Ovchinnikov is choreographer, performer, composer, lecturer, poet, and organizer of the annual international dance festival Zelyonka Space UP in Kyiv. Since 2008, he is the artistic director of the Black O!Range dance productions company. The company was recognized as one of the most distinctive and original dance projects in Ukraine. In 2015, Ovchinnikov cofounded All-Ukrainian Association “Contemporary Dance Platform”. Main objectives of the Association are to support young Ukrainian choreographers, integrate contemporary dance into the modern cultural life of Ukraine and establish the national center of contemporary dance. In 2016-2021 Anton Ovchinnikov presented a few solo performances and created four multidisciplinary projects. In 2017, he was an ArtsLink International Fellow. Since 2018, Anton Ovchinnikov is the member of the expert panel of Ukrainian Cultural Foundation.

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Features and posts
On creating work during war
Monochrome
Conversation with Anton Ovchinnikov and dance critic Polina Bulat, both from Ukraine, moderated by Simon Dove of CEC ArtsLink as part of BIPOD 22

Bozhena Pelenska is Director of the Jam Factory Art Center, a new multi-disciplinary contemporary art center in a former industrial building in Lviv, Ukraine. Bozhena is responsible for the Art Center’s development strategy, program development, management, and institutional development. She developed the concept and program activities of the Art Center. Bozhena studied Cultural Studies, Art History, Philosophy and Art Management. She has participated in international programs of cultural management, cultural diplomacy and exchange programs. A graduate of the University of Lviv and the University of Ottawa with a degree in Cultural Studies, Bozhena is currently a graduate student at the DeVos Institute of Arts Management, University of Maryland.

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Daria Prydybailo is an art historian, cultural manager, and curator from Kyiv. She has worked at leading cultural institutions in Ukraine and Germany such as the National Art and Culture Museum Complex Mystetskyi Arsenal and the National Museum for Contemporary Art Hamburger Bahnhof. Among her curated exhibitions are “Squeezed in Infinity,” “Seeing Without Light” (co-curated with Sam Bardaouil), and “War/She.” Besides, she has run non-institutional projects such as Transitory White magazine on art and activism in Eastern Europe, Caucasus, and Central Asia and the international feminist platform womanorial. She worked on large-scale international exhibitions such as the International Forum Art Kyiv and the First Kyiv Biennale of Contemporary Art ARSENALE 2012.

She is the founder of the cultural NGO Art Matters Ukraine, working on the development of cross-cultural dialogue, supporting independent artistic voices, and strengthening post-colonial discourse in the contemporary art world.

As a singer and songwriter, she has a music project called Kyiv Siren. Daria contributes a monthly column on Ukrainian art to the regional newspaper “Ridnyj Kraj,” Ukraine.

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Kateryna Radchenko, Ukrainian curator and director of Odesa Photo Days Festival, works directly with photographers at the frontlines. Currently, Kateryna is collecting and curating photos from the war zone in order to produce international publications, exhibitions, events and create opportunities for people around the world to experience these visual stories and narratives first hand. Throughout the heated days of war, Kateryna and her team work as an aid for international media outlets in Odesa and Lviv, supporting photographers who are stuck, in danger or go to the frontlines as independent artists.

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Veronika Seleha is a CEO of the creative agency BICKERSTAFF.OOO producing campaigns for business and government development in Ukraine and internationally. She is also part of the strategic development group at the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra, an important religious and cultural center in Ukraine. Veronika served as the Director General of the Directorate for Humanitarian Policy at the Presidential Office of Ukraine.

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Volodymyr Sheiko is the Director General of Ukrainian Institute Kyiv. He is a specialist in culture management, marketing and communications. Volodymyr held senior positions in the Ukrainian mission of the British Council for 11 years. He organized numerous cultural projects and events in the UK and 15 European countries: exhibitions, art residencies, film festivals, professional internships, concerts, literary programs, trainings, and theater productions.

A graduate of the Institute of International Relations of the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Volodymyr received a professional diploma in marketing in 2009, and in 2014 – a diploma in digital marketing from the The Chartered Institute of Marketing (UK). In 2011, he graduated from the Summer School of Scottish Universities SUISS in the field of “Contemporary British and Irish Literature” (Edinburgh, Scotland). Volodymyr is a Member of the 2016 Summer School of Global Governance; the international network of Bucerius Summer School (ZEIT-Stiftung, Hamburg, Germany); and the IETM International Professional Performing Arts Network and the Total Theater Network.

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Liubov Shuba is the Head of Information Department at the Memorial Museum of Totalitarian Regimes “Territory of Terror” in Lviv.

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Katya Taylor is a curator, manager of cultural projects, and contemporary art expert. Her current volunteer project Artists Support Ukraine helps organize exhibitions across the world to promote and support Ukrainian artists during the Russian invasion. Katya curated The Captured House, the exhibition that tells the story of the war in Ukraine through the eyes of 50 contemporary artists. The show traveled to Amsterdam, Berlin, Brussels, and Rome.

Katya is the founder of the Port.agency. Her multidisciplinary collaborations include projects with UNISEF, UN Woman, World Food Programme, Anti-Corruption Initiative of the European Union, UNDP, Yorkshire Sculpture Park (England), British Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce, European Bank of Reconstruction and Development, and Vogue Ukraine, among others.

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Les Vynogradov is a cultural manager, writer, musician, and game designer from Kyiv, Ukraine. He is currently a Weltoffenes Berlin fellow with Initiative Neue Musik Berlin (INM). Les is a project manager at Kyiv Contemporary Music Days, running the Instrumental grant program and Contemporary Classical Music Portfolio UA. He is the co-founder of Zapravka Initiative for Art Residency Support. Previously, he was the Head of Visual Art at the Ukrainian Institute and helped launch the EXTER residency program; Visualise exhibition support program; and Ukraine Everywhere, a program promoting the visual culture of Ukraine online. 

Les is the co-founder of Heden Smugglers, an indie game studio working on an adventure title Hedenite. He has a solo music project anom and is a member of the doom metal band Vin de Mia Trix. Les is contributing a monthly column, Follow the Fellow, to INM’s field notes online magazine. 

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Photo by Valentyn Kuzan

Hnat Zabrodskyy is a senior-level manager in the field of culture, a legal expert with more than ten years of expertise, and an organizational transformation and development specialist. Hnat leads legal operations at the Museum of Contemporary Art MOCA NGO and the Pavilion of Culture CF. He also leads the UALR project focused on developing new regulations and institutions for a sustainable framework for the emergent Ukrainian cultural ecosystem. Hnat is continuously engaged in the development of common memory practices and dialogue-related projects as an independent expert and as a senior scholar for the Kyiv School of Economics.

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