Past Residents Maria Budnikova
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Maria Budnikova, Dreams, from the series The Anatomy Of A Dead Tree, pencil and watercolor on paper, ongoing project started in 2022
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Maria Budnikova, Kiev, from the series The Anatomy Of A Dead Tree, pencil on paper, ongoing project started in 2022
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Maria Budnikova, Larisa, from the series The Anatomy Of A Dead Tree, pencil on paper, ongoing project started in 2022
Maria Budnikova is an artist, vocalist, songwriter and a landscape architect. She was born in Kiev, Ukraine and had to flee her home as many other Ukrainians because of the military invasion. Now Maria stays at one of the HIAP’s residencies and continues her professional practice.
She works in many different media from painting and drawing to landscape art and installation.
Maria attended numerous Institutions such as: Harvard University, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Temple University, Kiev Institute of Humanities, National Academy of Art and Architecture, Anhalt University of Applied Science.
Maria Budnikova is a recipient of many international awards. Her works are in private and museum collections in Europe and the United States.
As a refugee I am traveling the world now and share my personal story as well as my culture with others by the means of art.
At the art residency I am working on my new album where I write songs about my recent life experience and the affect of the war on my life and lives of others. It is about memory, love and hope.
Also, I was creating and finished an installation work and continue to work on the series of drawings The Anatomy Of A Dead Tree.
My recent project reflects the state of solitude. I find parts of dead trees in places I travel to and depict them on canvas or paper along with objects that I have personal connection to. The placement of objects emphasises their inconvenient presence in the chosen space, the personal emotional separation within the external rupture. I often use images of architectural elements from historical buildings in Kiev. In my drawings the landscape of the city exists under the flower spread, decorative elements of baroque architecture, faceted glasses filled with liquid. The city as a metaphor for ones home, nevertheless referencing a home-town, depicted through conventional forms. The city and the country which is going through the war and devastation now. I find it is important to depict the beauty of it, that would stay in our memory. The theme of water repeats throughout my works. It continues from the sea, to the water in the glass, the fountain and the rain. An internally changeable substance that emphasises a short existence of depicted objects in the present moment.
Maria Budnikova is currently in-residence at Nelimarkka Museum for the period 1.1.–31.3.2023.
Budnikova’s residency is realised in the context of the Ukraine Solidarity Residencies programme. The current partners of the programme are AARK, Art Centre Salmela, Connecting Points programme, Fairres, Goethe-Institut Finnland, HIAP – Helsinki International Artist Programme, Loviisa Art Support Association, Nelimarkka Museum, Pro Artibus, The Finnish Artists’ Studio Foundation, The Finnish Illustration Association Kuvittajat, and Värtsilä Artist Residency.
In 2023, the programme is supported by Kone Foundation and Nordic Culture Point.