Artists

Mariia Kulykivska

Born 1988 in Kerch, Ukraine. She lives and works in Kyiv. Kulykivska received a masters degree of architecture from the National Academy of Art and Architecture, Kyiv. She was the winner of several contests such as the RutaRuna Project for young artists from Ukraine and Sweden (2013), In Search of Spaces of Negotiation, by Foundation CSM (2012), the Swiss non-profit organization AKKU (2011–2012), Mukhi 2010 at the Bottega Gallery in Kyiv and many others. She currently teaches the visual culture of contemporary art to children at the PinchukArtCentre.

The nucleus of Mariia Kulykivska’s work is her own body, its perpetuation, its transformation and its decay. Throughout her young oeuvre the idea of her body has transformed into architectural structures made from natural materials, such as salt, milk or sugar, dealing with ideas of production, construction and de-construction.

Recent exhibitions:

2013 – “Where the wind blows” installation, National Art Museum of Ukraine, Kyiv 2013 – Group project “Beautiful”, installation “Army of Clone.2”, RuArts, Moscow, Russia

2013 – Group project “Introversia”, installation “No name”, M17 Contemporary Art Center, Kyiv, Ukraine

2013 – Performance in public space ("Wein & Co" shop), Uster, Switzerland

2012 – “SWEET/SS LIFE” – solo show as a scholarship holder, an awardee of AKKU Kunstleratelier and Uster Department of Culture, Zurich, Switzerland

For at the exhibition of the 20 shortlisted artists for the PinchukArtCentre Prize 2013, Kulykivska creates a new sculpture made of self-produced salt bricks she uses to construct a landscape of 25 pillars, which by the very nature of the material and production will be in continuous decay.