Varvara Kuzmina is an interdisciplinary artist and educator born in Vladimir, Russia, in 1982. Since 2022 she is based in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Working across moving image, photography, text, sound, computer graphics, and game elements, she addresses the theme of contact. Her projects explore the possibilities of connection, boundaries and distance. Kuzmina engages viewers through layers of time, space, and mythological structures, acting as a medium between the experiences of her characters and the audience. Artists’s works are often linked to the recent history of her native country, and the human condition under the circumstances of unfreedom and dictatorship.

EDUCATION

2018 / 2022 The Rodchenko Art School of Photography and Multimedia, Moscow

2015 / 2016 FotoDepartment, course “Mythology of the Region” curated by Anastasia Bogomolova, Saint-Petersburg

2015 / 2016 FotoDepartment, course “Overcoming Photography”, curated by Nadezhda Sheremetova, Saint-Petersburg

2014 / 2015 FotoDepartment, course “Documentary Photography”, curated by Mikhail Domozhilov, Saint-Petersburg

2000 / 2006 Vladimir State Pedagogical University, Department of Foreign Languages, Vladimir

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2022 Media Project of Lydia Ricker and Varvara Kuzmina, OkNo Gallery, Chelyabinsk

2018 “Stone Poem”, OkNo Gallery, Chelyabinsk

2017 “Stone Poem” as part of the residency “New Stories of Yekaterinburg”, Metenkov House Museum of Photography, Yekaterinburg

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2022 “Where We Are Not”, Cultural Foundation Ekaterina, Moscow

2021 “Giorni…ultimi”, Peresvetov Pereulok Gallery, Moscow

2021 “KOS20MOS21”, Media Center of Zaryadye Park, Moscow

2020 “A Person in Translation”, Kolos Art Space, Krasnodar.

2020 “Nemoskva is not far off”, Manege Central Exhibition Hall, St. Petersburg

2020  “A Person in Translation”, Izmailovo Gallery, Moscow

2019 “Children’s things”, Maxim Boxer Gallery, Moscow

2019 “In Aid of Facts”, Rodchenko Art School of Photography and Multimedia, Moscow

2018 Exhibition as part of the Laboratory of the Art Festival Art-Subject, Vladimir

2018 “Place of Landing. Space Connection”, Radishchev Museum, Saratov

2018 “Who Are You Treating?”, IMHO Gallery, Saratov

2018 Connections, Belgrade Photo Month, Gallery Kvaka 22

2017 Special project of the Ural Industrial Biennale of Contemporary Art “This Work Never Ends”, Tyumen Museum-Educational Association, Tyumen

2017 “The House Where Culture Lives”, “Art-Subject Festival”, Vladimir

2017 Site-specific installation “Anomaly”, Music Festival Gagarin Party, Vladimir region

2017 “Mythologique”, OkNo gallery, Chelyabinsk

2016 “Mythologique”, Metenkov House Museum of Photography, Yekaterinburg

2016 “The Present is Happening”, FotoDepartment Gallery, St. Petersburg

2016 Site-specific installation “Between Pages”, together with artist Natalia Kuzmina Boofest festival, Vladimir, Russia

ART RESIDENCES

2017 “New Stories of Yekaterinburg, ” Metenkov House Museum of Photography, Yekaterinburg

ZINES

2017 “Stone Poem”, publishing house Metenkov House Museum of Photography, Yekaterinburg

CURATORIAL EXPERIENCE

2018 “Art-Subject” Festival, Vladimir, exhibition “Inverse Perspective”

2018  “Art-Subject” Festival, Vladimir, Laboratory and exhibition based on its results.

2017 “Art-Subject” Festival, Vladimir, curator of Photography section (lecture and multimedia program) and the exhibition “The House Where Culture Lives”.