Ukrainian Contemporary Art and Feminism: Histories within a History | Kultura 2025

Dr Olena Syaivo Dmytryk

University of Cambridge

Researcher, University of Cambridge

Lecture Title:

Ukrainian Contemporary Art and Feminism: Histories within a History

Lecture Synopsis:

The lecture introduces the broader context of the development of both contemporary art and feminist movements in Ukraine. We will look at the emergence of “contemporary art” in the 1990s as a new concept, set of practices, and institutions, and the significance this change had for women artists. Turning to the Women’s Workshop art project, we will then explore the shift that took place in the 2010s with more artists self-identifying as feminists, and the themes that these artists explored in their works.

Finally, we will discuss recent works of feminist artists, and why feminist art is important for Ukrainian politics, society, and culture in a global context.

Biography:

Dr Olena Syaivo Dmytryk is a researcher from Ukraine currently based in the UK. Their work focuses on Ukraine and lies at the intersection of social movement studies, the histories and theories of sexuality and gender, and visual culture studies. In 2024–2025, they were a Methods Fellow at Cambridge Digital Humanities and co-directed a course on sexuality and decoloniality for the Invisible University for Ukraine certificate programme.

You can enrol for the full course here.