Oksana Briukhovetska
Oksana Briukhovetska lives in Kyiv, Ukraine. Her recent artistic practice focused on textile collage. She also works as a curator and writes about Ukrainian contemporary art. She addresses topics of memory, trauma, woman’s labor, feminism, solidarity and connections between different group of people in the world who go through struggle and decolonization. She touch on social topics through the study of personal experiences. Her work addresses the issues of war in Ukraine, Ukrainian labor migration, the realities of motherhood, femininity. Her research practice often includes interviews and conversations, while utilizing a wide range of mediums: drawing, painting, textile, writing, public installation, and interventions into urban spaces. She also works as a graphic designer. For nearly a decade she worked as a curator at the Visual Culture Research Center in Kyiv, where her main intention was to give voice to women artists. Among her curatorial projects of that time were exhibitions Childhood Uncensored, Ukrainian Body, Lockout, Motherhood, What in Me is Feminine?, TEXTUS. Textile, Embroidery, Feminism. She researched feminist art in Eastern and Western Europe and is co-editor with Lesia Kulchynska of the book collection of interviews The Right to Truth: Conversations on Art and Feminism (2019). In 2020-2024 she lived in the U.S., and in 2023 graduated from MFA at Stamps School of Art and Design at the University of Michigan. In 2020-2021 she worked on the research interviewing Americans about Black Lives Matter protests and in 2025 published book Black Lives Matter Voices in Ukraine to present a more critical discussion of race and anti-racist struggle. She was a co-curator of the Ukrainian part of Secondary Archive, the platform for women artists from Central and Eastern Europe (2021-2024), and a curator at the Martin Roth Initiative (MRI) residency for Ukrainian women artists (2024-2025) that resulted in the publication and the exhibition both titled Meaning after Loss. She edited the collection of the projects by Ukrainian women artists Meaning after Loss (2025).
Selected Exhibitions and Projects:
Meaning after Loss. Exhibition, Ukrainian House, Kyiv, Ukraine, with support of Martin Roth Initiative, Germany. Curator, Artist.
Archipelago of History. Exhibition. PinchukArtCentre, Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist.
Your Story Mirrors Mine. Exhibition. Ukraїnka Gallery, Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist.
Sugar and Poppy. Solo exhibition. Kut_artistrunspace. Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist.
What Brings Us Together? Solo exhibition of textiles. Michigan League and Palmor Commons, University of Michigan. Artist.
Secondary Archive. Ukraine, Second edition. Women Artists in War. Co-curator.
Handle with Care. Exhibition, Ludwig Múzeum. Budapest, Hungary. Artist.
Portraits of Sisterhood. Solo exhibition. Lehetőségek tere, Budapest, Hungary. Artist.
The Work That Textile Does. Exhibition, Central Museum of Textiles in Łódź, Poland. Artist.
Seven For a Secret Never To Be Told. MFA Graduate Thesis Exhibition. Stamps Gallery, Ann Arbor, MI, USA. Artist.
I have a crisis for you… Women Artists of Ukraine Respond to War. Exhibition, Lane Hall Gallery, University of Michigan, USA. Artist.
Sleepless in Warsaw. Exhibition. A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn NY, USA. Artist.
Today dreams smell of heat. Exhibition in Czapski Palace, Warsaw, Poland. Artist.
Michigan Emerging Artists Exhibition. The Alluvium Gallery, Kendall College of Art and Design, Grand Rapids, MI, USA. Artist.
Ukrainian Sisters. Exhibition, Stamps School of Art and Design, University of Michigan, USA. Curator.
Ukraine. A Different Angle on Neighbourhood. Exhibition, International Cultural Center, Krakow, Poland. Artist.
My 1990s. Solo home-exhibition. Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist.
Self-Destruction and Self-Care. Group home-exhibition. Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist.
Neighbors. Exhibition, Warsaw Under Construction X Festival, former Cepelia Pavilion, Warsaw, Poland. Co-curator, Artist.
I am Ukrainka. Poster campaign. Warsaw Under Construction X Festival. In collaboration with the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw, Poland. Curator, Designer, Artist.
Erotic Diary. Grassroot art book, Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist, Co-editor.
Women about Women. Exhibition, Assortment Room, Promprylad. Renovation. Ivano-Frankivsk, Ukraine. Co-curator, Lecturer.
TEXTUS. Embroidery, Textile, Feminism. Exhibition, Visual Culture Research Center, Kyiv, Ukraine. Curator, Artist, Designer, Editor of the catalog.
Do or Die. Exhibition, Local_30, Warsaw, Poland. Artist.
Women’s Texts. Exhibition, TRANSEUROPA Festival, Casa del Reloj, Madrid, Spain. Parallel program of International Kyiv Biennial, 2017. Curator, Artist.
5th Odessa Biennale of Contemporary Art. Odessa, Ukraine. Artist.
Visit From Ghosts. Exhibition, Visual Culture Research Center, Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist.
Motherhood. Exhibition, Visual Culture Research Center, Kyiv, and Palace of Art, Lviv, Ukraine. Curator, Artist, Designer.
What in Me is Feminine? Polish-Ukrainian exhibition. Visual Culture Research Center, Kyiv, Ukraine. Curator, Artist, Designer.
Lockout. Exhibition, Visual Culture Research Center, Kyiv, Ukraine. Co-curator (with Stanislaw Ruksza, Poland), Artist, Designer.
Feminist (Art) Critique. Exhibition, Gender Route, Minsk, Belarus. Artist.
Ukrainian Body. Exhibition, Visual Culture Research Center of the University of Kyiv Mohyla Academy, Kyiv, Ukraine. Co-curator, Artist, Designer.
The Women’s Work Unit. Exhibition, Feminist Ofenzyva, Visual Culture Research Center of the University of Kyiv Mohyla Academy, Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist.
Book Lunch and Book Lunch II. Exhibitions, Center for Contemporary Art and Book Arsenal Festival, Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist.
Childhood Uncensored. Exhibition, Visual Culture Research Center of the University of Kyiv Mohyla Academy, Kyiv, Ukraine. Co-curator, Artist.
Children’s Book. Solo exhibition in the public space of an apartment house. In collaboration with “Svidomo” public organization, Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist.
Calligraphy. Solo exhibition, Cinema Club of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, Kyiv, Ukraine. Artist.
Nu. Exhibition, Gallery of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, Kyiv, Ukraine. Curator, Artist.
Big Graphic. Exhibition, Gallery of Kyiv-Mohyla academy, Kyiv, Ukraine. Curator, Artist.
Publications:
Ukrainian:
2025: Black Lives Matter Voices. Choven. 2025.
2024: “Everything is Terrible and Beautiful at Once! Both War and Spring Have Come!”: Sonia Gukailo’s Retablos.
2021: About Natalia Bazilevich, artist of the 1990s. YourArt.
Drawn in White on Black. Blaskness of Dian Edison’s drawings put light on some stereotypes that tied with non-universal truths. YourArt.
2020: “Motherhood” Exhibition. Landscape as a monument. Curatorial Handbook. Edited by O. Pohrebniak, D.Chepurnyi, K.Yakovlenko. Kyiv: Izolyatsia. Platform for Cultural Initiatives. 2020.
What Do We Want? Justice! When Do We Want It? Now! (Part II) Black Lives Matter participants sharing their thoughts. Suspilne.
What Do We Want? Justice! When Do We Want It? Now! (Part I) Black Lives Matter protests in the USA. LB.
Name, Life and Body: American Notes around Black Lives Matter 2020 Political Critique Ukraine.
We Can’t Breathe! YourArt
In the Future and the Past Simultaneously. Noga #1, 2020.
2019: The Right to Truth. Conversations on Art and Feminism. Edited by Oksana Briukhovetska and Lesia Kulchynska. VCRC and European Alternatives, Kyiv: AVANTPOST-PRIM House. 2019.
Mikhail Koptiev’s Genital Panic YourArt.
Oksana Briukhovetska about the “Right to Truth”, Feminism and Motherhood YourArt.
Looking Behind the Scenes. Metamorphoses and Reflections Political Critique Ukraine.
2018: “I am a Ukrainka”: Poster Campaign Calling for Feflection on the Status of Women Migrant Workers Ukrainian Pravda.
Sex in “Hetero” Style: From the 1990s to the Present Gender in Details.
Spoiled “Fresh Meat”: Field Research on Ukrainian Sexism Ukrainian Pravda.
2017: TEXTUS. Catalog of the TEXTUS. Embroidery, Textile, Feminism Exhibition. VCRC, Kyiv: AVANTPOST-PRIM House. 2017.
The Image of the Victim and Emancipation. Essay on the Ukrainian Art Scene and Feminism Prostory.
Venuses Gender in Details.
Intimacy in Minor Political Critique Ukraine.
2016: Eat My Body Korydor.
2015: Women and Her Body Political Critique Ukraine.
Meet Me: About What in Me is Feminine? Exhibition ArtUkraine.
Ex-Machina Postwomen Political Critique Ukraine.
Gender Roles: Training of the Bodies Korydor.
Oksana Briukhovetska: It is Time for Our Society to Overcome Prejudices Against Feminism Insider.
2014: Workers in front of the Closed Door Izin.
2010: Ukrainian Body. Homeless People and Children Prostory.
English:
Art Stitches Ruptured Time Back Together. Introduction in the Meaning After Loss, a collection of the projects of Ukrainian women artists, participants of the Martin Roth Initiative residency.
Threads of Memory: Ukrainian Art Textile at the Material Matters.
How Are You? Ukrainian Art During Wartime.
Beyond Three Colors: Exploring Soviet Memory of Race in Freedom Taking Place, War, Women, and Culture at the Intersection of Ukraine, Poland, and Belarus. Edited with an Introduction by Jessica Zychowicz. Vernon Press. 2023.
The Right to Truth. Conversations on Art and Feminism. Edited by Oksana Briukhovetska and Lesia Kulchynska. VCRC and European Alternatives, Kyiv: AVANTPOST-PRIM House. 2019.
I am Ukrainka Political Critique.
TEXTUS. Catalog of the TEXTUS. Embroidery, Textile, Feminism Exhibition.
Kyiv: AVANTPOST-PRIM House. 2017.
What in Me is Feminist? n.paradoxa. Vol 38. 2016.
What in me is Feminine? Political Critique.
Briukhovetska: Social insecurity and hopelessness were symbols of the post USSR region Political Critique.
Lockout – Oksana Briukhovetska about the exhibition Political Critique.
Russian:
Why I Showed Hard Up Ukrainian Women in Poland and How It’s Connected with Feminism Update.
One, Two, Dance… Gender Studies, No. 23 (1/2018). Edited by Irina Zherebkina: Kharkiv Center for Gender Studies Research.
Biennale in Faces Officiel.
Everyday Life as a Battlefield Political Critique Ukraine.
Contemporary Artist’s Wife Values Freedom of Creativity ArtUkraine.
Feminist Pencil: At the Dividing Line ArtUkraine.
Polish:
For as long as I can remember, I was afraid of war Political Critique.
Czech:
I’m Ukrainian, you can’t see me A2.
German:
Wita Grunitsch. Geleitworte für N. / Prostory #6, 2013.
Education:
2021 – 2023: MFA, Stamps School Of Art & Design, Univercity of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA
1997–2003: National Academy of Visual Arts and Architecture, Kyiv, Ukraine. Graduated from the Department of Graphic and Book Illustrations.
1996-1997: Classes of Drawing at Art Studio of Sculptor Mykola Rapai, Kyiv, Ukraine.
1989–1994: Lviv School of Applied Art, Lviv, Ukraine. Graduated from the Department of Artistic Ceramics.
Awards:
2022: The Igor Zabel Award Grant for Culture and Theory
2023: Hoopwood Graduate Fiction Award, University of Michigan
Chamberlain Writing Award for Creative Writing, University of Michigan