Join artists Olia Fedorova and Alevtina Kakhidze for a conversation about their respective practices and their works in Women at War, moderated by exhibition curator, Monika Fabijanska.

Olia Fedorova (b. 1994 in Kharkiv) is a conceptual artist who works with performance, photography, video, and text. She graduated from the Kharkiv State Academy of Design and Fine Arts in 2016. She was the winner of the Nathan Altman Contemporary Visual Art Contest, Vinnytsia, 2017; a finalist of Ukrainian Biennale of Young Art, Kharkiv, 2019; and MUHi (Young Ukrainian Artists), Kyiv, 2017. Solo exhibitions include: Municipal gallery, Kharkiv, 2021, 2017; Contemporary Art Center Tea Factory, Odessa, 2017; and several galleries in Kharkiv, Kyiv, and Dnipro. Group exhibitions include Eye/View II organized by Videocity, Electronic Billboard at the Congress Center Basel, 2022; Association for Contemporary Art, Graz, 2020; Brüdershaft project, supported by the German Embassy in Ukraine (Kyiv, Kharkiv, Dnipro), 2020; International Winter Land Art Festival Mythogenesis (Nemyriv, Ukraine, 2017-2020; and Museum of Ideas, Lviv, 2017. Fedorova participated in many artist residency programs, including in Mariupol, Ukraine; in the UK, Austria, Germany, and Poland; as well as online during the covid-19 pandemic, including Co-iki Arts Living Space (Tokyo), and American Art Incubator residency (Isolation Fund, Kyiv/Zero1, San-Francisco). Fedorova lives and works in Kharkiv – since May 2022, she has been a refugee in Graz, Austria.

oliafedorova.com  

Alevtina Kakhidze (b. 1973 in Zhdanivka, Donetsk oblast) is an artist, performer, curator, and gardener who focuses on drawing, and social and ecofeminist practice. Since 2018, she has served as the United Nations (UNDP) Tolerance Envoy in Ukraine. Kakhidze graduated from the National Academy of Fine Arts in Kyiv, 2004, and Jan van Eyck Academie in Maastricht, 2006, and was awarded the Kazimir Malevich Artist Award in 2008. She presented her performances and lectures at the UNWomen Conference, 2020; PinchukArtCentre, Kyiv, 2019; Whitechapel Gallery, London, 2016; Manifesta 10, 2014; The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, 2015; 7th Berlin Biennale: KW Institute for Contemporary Art, 2012; and The New Theatre in the New Great World, Warsaw, 2010. Her solo exhibitions include rum24, Aarhus, Denmark, 2020; Bozar, Brussels, 2017; PinchukArtCentre, Kyiv, 2014; FUTURA Centre for Contemporary Art, Prague, 2013; and Iaspis, Stockholm, 2009. Her works were featured in group shows at the M17 Contemporary Art Center, Kyiv, 2021; Elisabeth Jones Art Center, Portland, OR, 2021; Ludwig Museum, Budapest, 2018; M HKA, Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp, 2018; Wurttembergischer Kunstverein, Stuttgart, 2017; Kunsthall Trondheim, Norway, 2016; National Museum of Modern Art, Kyiv, 2014; CCA Zamek Ujazdowski, Warsaw, 2013; Moroccan Pavilion project at the 54th Venice Biennial, 2012; MOCAK, Krakow; Galeria Arsenał, Białystok, Poland; and Mystetskyi Arsenal, Kyiv, all 2011. Since 2009, Kakhidze has lived and worked in Muzychi village near Kyiv.

alevtinakakhidze.com