Veronika Kyrychenko
Veronika Kyrychenko is an artist and psychologist whose artistic practice is a means to release the emotions stemming from the therapy sessions she conducts. She has implemented art therapy in her clinical work for over 15 years as a way to encourage communication.
“The inner world of a person is impossible to describe in words. I see it as something abstract, before language. Our feelings are broader, heavier and denser than we can describe. Language only limits the message we transmit when we say how we feel. This is what I’m trying to express in my art.”
She graduated from the National City University, Dnipro in 1992 with a degree in biology, and completed her PhD in 1999. In 2004 she earned another degree, graduating with a BA in psychology from Sevastopol City University. Between 1996-2018 Veronica taught physiology and psychology at university and began working as a consulting psychologist in 2006. Due to the global pandemic in 2020, Veronika was forced to change the way she met clients. She turned to art and paints every day for four hours. During her work, Veronika remembers the stories of her clients - their dreams and concerns, inability to accept the truth, or see the reality as it is, to admit a conflict or lack of will to improve or work on mental blockages or limitations. She reveals their most sacred emotions through her art, releasing herself from burden or worry.
Her first collection of 335 paintings reflects on the emotional journey of living through the military conflict in Eastern Ukraine, the emotional revelations of clients and her frequent trips to Europe. She began exhibiting in 2009, participating in ‘Sophia’, an art exhibition hosted in the Nizhny Novgorod State Art Museum. Veronika hosted her debut solo exhibition in Dnipro, Ukraine, in 2011. Her first European show was in October 2020 at Azur Gallery, Madrid, Spain. She has collaborated with Saatchi Art, MADS Milano, WorldArtWeek, Van Gogh Art Gallery, Premio Gugliemo II and Luxembourg Art Prize.
