Dreams those didn`t come true
About Artist
Nadiia Volkova
Nadiia Volkova is a Ukrainian photographer and visual artist whose practice explores the body, identity, vulnerability, and the psychological dimensions of human experience. Her work is informed by her background in psychology and psychotherapy, which shapes her interest in the ways personal history, social expectations, intimacy, and memory become embodied. Working primarily with photography, Volkova is interested in the human body not simply as a visual subject, but as a space where individual and collective narratives meet. Her images often focus on intimacy, nudity, fragments of the body, and states that exist beyond conventional representations of beauty, sexuality, and gender. She is particularly interested in the moments when the body stops performing and is allowed to exist in its vulnerability, ambiguity, and ordinary presence. Volkova began exhibiting her work in 2016, when she became the principal and sole photographer of *We Are People. We Are Equal*, a photography exhibition presented at the Taras Shevchenko National Museum in Kyiv. The exhibition was organized by CrimeaSOS with the support of UNHCR and dedicated to the idea of equality, human dignity, and the right to respectful treatment regardless of differences in background, nationality, or beliefs. In 2017, Volkova participated in the interdisciplinary photo performance *Everything That Will Remain* at the Lesya Ukrainka Museum in Kyiv, combining her photographs with live music and exploring the relationship between art, everyday life, memory, and the passage of time. Her photographic work has also been presented at the International Festival of Fine Art Photography *Parade of Projects* at the Taras Shevchenko National Museum, in the group exhibition *Erotic Art Photo 2019*, and in exhibitions in Kyiv's Art Passage and MODI Art & Wine Gallery. Her photographic practice extends beyond gallery exhibitions. Since 2016, Volkova has worked as the principal photographer for Shi Fest Ukraine, a shibari art festival in Kyiv, and has collaborated with fire performance artists, theatre companies, and interdisciplinary performance projects. In 2017, her work received recognition in the Plant Photography category of the Ukrainian Botanical Group competition, followed by several other competition awards. Alongside her artistic practice, Volkova works in psychology and psychotherapy, with a particular interest in the body, trauma, sexuality, and human relationships. This dual perspective—artist and psychologist—allows her to approach photography as a form of visual inquiry into how people inhabit their bodies and construct their identities. Today, Volkova's artistic focus is centered on the body and identity. Through intimate and often understated images, she questions the cultural expectations placed upon bodies and explores the possibility of seeing vulnerability not as weakness, but as a form of freedom and dignity.
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