Vlodko (Volodymyr) Kaufmann

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).