An artist, graphic
artist, painter,
performer, curator. Since 1974, he has lived and worked in Lviv.
Born in 1957 in
Karaganda (Kazakhstan).
In 1974,
upon advice from his art school teacher, he entered the Ivan Trush School of Arts and
Crafts and moved to Lviv. He graduated in 1978 and proceeded to the Faculty of Architecture at
Lviv Polytechnic Institute, where he studied for two years.
Kaufman is a co-founder of important art institutions
in Lviv:
in 1989-1993,
he was a member of the Shliakh (lit. "The Way") art society;
in 1993,
he co-founded the Dzyga Art Association; in 2007, he co-founded the Institute of
Contemporary Art that ran the Week of Contemporary Art in Lviv and the Days of
Performance Art in Lviv.
Vlodko Kaufman arrived at his genuine art genre vydyvo (spectacle + video) through the search and art experimentation in various
formats and techniques. It was also fertilized by the context of political perestroika that started in the Soviet
Union in 1986. He
recalls:
"I was impressed by a huge
fresh ground of opportunities that suddenly opened up to me; I decided to give it a try and to combine in one project installation, painting, and theatrical performance — anything you can imagine" (Koval, "Vlodko Kaufman: "Art for me is a disease which is difficult to get rid of," 2006).
Through experimenting in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Kaufman found his medium. Nevertheless, he always claims it is not the most
important thing: "…
what I find most important is the idea and the ideology, while the technology for implementing a project comes second, though no less important. However, the idea should always dictate the
form, not otherwise." Thus vydyvo
is a genre that combines graphic art, painting, installations,
performance, and happening. In
the material form, it is something between a spectacle and a video.
Kaufman has authored numerous exhibitions, theatrical shows, and projects in
Ukraine and beyond. His present activities focus on long-term projects: Nests for Trees; Ecotheater (Biotheater); Fish-therapy and Bird-therapy. The latter was enabled through the etching technique he started back in the early days of
becoming an artist.
Nataliya Shymin, Vlodko Kaufman's wife, is a textile and costume designer, and a scene designer. They jointly made several theatrical projects,
such as the scene design for "The Apocrypha" production in Les Kurbas
Lviv Youth Theater, directed by Volodymyr Kuchynskyi (1996), and the "Third Millenium" jointly with Antonina Denisiuc and Serhiy Synitsyn in the Lviv Palace of Arts (1997). They also had a joint installation performance "The
Diary" in Dzyga (1998).
2008 — Everyday Excursion, performance, Holy Poltva, installation as part of Art Depot project (Lviv)
2008 — A Declaration of Emptiness, performance as part of GogolFest (Kyiv)
2008 — A Spectacle in the Clock, performance and video art inside the clock mechanism of the city hall building in Drohobych, as part of the 3rd International Bruno Schulz Festival (Drohobych)
2008 — N.N., installation, performance at the Week of Contemporary Art (Lviv)
2009 — Chessboard, performance at the Week of Contemporary Art
2010 — The Time of Fish, перформанс, SchulzFest (Drohobych)
2010 — An Attempt of Premonition, installation, International Art Festival "Fort.missia" (Popovychi village in Lviv Oblast)
2010 — N.N., perfromance, Week of Contemporary Art
Participation in Group Projects (selected):
1989-1993 — took part in group exhibitions of the Shliakh Art association in Lviv, Kharkiv, Lublin and Krakow
1992 — Vyvykh Festival, chief artist (Lviv)
1993 — Ukrainian Youth for Christ festival, chief artist (Lviv)
1994 — All-Ukrainian tout of contemporary music "Freedom of Choice", chief artist;
1995 — Festival of Ukrainian Culture in Przemysl, chief artist;
1996 — Apocryphs theater production, scenography (together with Nataliya Shymin), Les Kurbas Youth Theater in Lviv (director Volodymyr Kuchynskyi)
1996 — Perfosalon, Dzyga
1996 — group exhibition of Ukrainian artists in Vienna
1996 — Own Experience, exhibition of paintings (Truskavets)
1997 — Third Millenium (together with Nataliya Shymin, Antonina Denisiuc and Serhiy Synitsyn), scenography, Lviv Palace of Arts;
1998 — Diffraction of Text, All-Ukrainian exhibition of artists' books, Dzyga
1998–1999 — Grands of Art, International art project, chief artist, Lviv Opera and Ballet Theater;
2001 — Icon Ghosts, Ecology-2003, art laboratory, Lviv Experimental Ceramic and Sculptural Factory
2001 — Bruno's Big Nest; Danylo Halytskyi Momument an other as part of the New Noah's Ark at the art laboratoty in Sida hamlet at the Vyshkivskyi Mountain Pass
2001 — Military Sentiment, installation, Mova Festival ("Language"), Dzyga
2003 — Our Taras, scenography, Yuriy Drohobych Regional Music and Drama Theater (Drohobych), director Roman Valko
2003 — donumenta. 2003 — Die Ukraine (Regensburg, Germany)
2004 — Art, scenography, Maria Zankovestka National Academic Ukrainian Theater of Drama, director Vadym Sikorskyi
2004 — Falling of a Flight, performance, video art, Utopia project in the L-Art Gallery in Kyiv
2005 — Josef Beuys, Beuys's Children Project, installation, Dzyga
2005 — Parrallels of Signs — Easter installations, Dzyga
2005 — Stolen Happiness (scenography), Young Spectator's Theater (Lviv), director Roman Valko
2005 — Narciss, art space, Les Kurbas Academic Theater in Lviv, director Volodymyr Kuchynskyi
2005 — N.N., object, 2nd Symposium "Ecology-Z000"; Time to Collect Stones, abandoned habsburg underground storages (Vysokyi Zamok, Lviv)
2006 — Waiting for Godot…, art space, scenography, Les Kurbas Academic Theater in Lviv, director Oleksiy Kravchuk
2006 — Amid the Paradise on Maidan, art space, director Volodymyr Kuchynskyi, Ivan Franko National Academic Theater (Kyiv)
2006 — МА–NA–HAT–TA, art space, director Volodymyr Kuchynskyi, Les Kurbas Academic Theater in Lviv
2007 — The Transformation of Avant-Garde, performance, together with Serhiy Savchenko and Yuriy Yaremchuk (Lublin, Poland)
2007 — reANIMATION, Lviv Art Gallery;
2007 — Who is Lviv, exhibition "Lviv" (The Great Synagogue of Berlin)
2007 — IDEA, performance, 4 Europejski Festiwal Sztuki Performance (Warsaw)
2007 — IDEA, performance, 2nd Days of Performance Art in Kyiv
2007 — Teplotrasa ("insulated pipeline"), object, VI Bienalle of experimental textile "Textile Frenzy" (Lviv)
2008 — Amnesia/ Petits Crimes Conjugaux (Partners in Crime), art space, director Volodymyr Kuchynskyi, Les Kurbas Academic Theater in Lviv
2008 — Two Flowers of Indigo Color, video sequence, director Oleksandr Bilozub, Ivan Franko National Academic Theater (Kyiv)
2008 — Week of Contemporary Art, curator (Lviv)
2009 — Ecotheater, installation, OPEN CITY International Festival (Lublin)
2009 — 1st International Art Festival Fort.missia, curator of supporting program
2009 — Week of Contemporary Art, curator (Lviv)
2010 — Ukrainian Cross-Section, curator of the triennale
2013 — Lyman II. Trienalle of contemporary Ukrainian art (Lublin)
2018 — Flashback. Ukrainian Media Art of the 1990s, Mystetskyi Arsenal (Kyiv)
