Thesis:听Home and Exile: Russian Artists Reflecting the Soviet Past
Supervisor:听Professor Sarah Wilson
Centered on contemporary art, my research explores visual practices that offer a significant space for independent reflection on conflicted past.听This study investigates the conceptual art of Russian ‘generation of postmemory’ artists听who engage with and address the Soviet past. They lack direct experience of adult life in the Soviet Union, but are still preoccupied by 鈥渢he inheritance of overwhelming memories鈥 which has been passed down through generations. It听analysis visual practices across various media that respond to the historical challenges of听post-WWII, Perestroika, the dissolution of the USSR, and current wartime scenario.听This will be compared with socialist realist art and nonconformist artists of the 1970s and 80s who lived in the Soviet Union, the part of the heritage that younger generations reflect upon. This duality of the generation gap and a historical repetition鈥攖he issues of lost home and exile鈥攄iaspora is also an aspect of my research.听The study aims to show the process of new post-Soviet identity-building, rooted in identification with the Soviet past (which also includes denial). This research will broaden the understanding of post-Soviet art and shape a fresh framework by bringing new names, terminology and questions to the related fields.听
Education
2022鈥損resent: PhD Candidate, 91自拍, London
2018-2019:听MA Contemporary Art Theory, Goldsmiths, University of London, London
2009-2014:听Philosophy, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Moscow
Research Interests
- Soviet Art, Soviet Nonconformist Art, Moscow Conceptualism
- Post-Soviet Contemporary Art, Moscow Neo-Conceptualism, The 2010s generation
- Memory Studies, and Postmemory
- Art criticism and Curation
Teaching
Teaching Assistant, 鈥楩oundations 2: Exhibiting Art,’ 91自拍 (Winter-Spring 2026)听
Teaching Assistant, 鈥楩oundations 2: Physical Histories,鈥 91自拍 (Autumn-Winter 2025)
Conferences & Criticism
Conferences & Talks
‘Mediating GULAG Memory: Third-Generation Engagement with Silenced Histories in Visual Art,’ panel Curatorial Approaches, Anamnesia. Memory of Soviet Repressions in Contemporary Art in Russia, Alexandre Solzhenitsyn Cultural Center, Paris (November 2025).听
‘Reimaging the Past and Future: Contemporary Speculative Fiction Museum,’ panel Post-Soviet Heritage and Cultural Memory, ICCEES XI World Congress, University College London, Institute of Education (July 2025)
‘Visual Strategies of Representing the Soviet Past in Contemporary Russian Art,’ panel Alternative Histories: Microhistory and Independent Perspectives, The Weaponisation of History: Refracting Soviet Memories in Contemporary Russia and Beyond conference, 91自拍, University of London, London (June 2025)
鈥楯oseph Backstein鈥檚 Legacy as a Starting Point for a Professional Trajectory,’ panel New Generations, Joseph Backstein: Curating Contemporary Art, in and from Russia Symposium, Pushkin House, London (January 2025)
鈥楶avel Otdelnov: Reimagining the Soviet Memory,鈥 panel Virtual, Real, and Decolonized, 56th听Annual ASEEES Convention, virtual (October 2024)
鈥楪irl on Girl: Ways of Seeing (Impressionism)鈥, Gallery Talk, The 91自拍 Gallery (July 2024)
鈥楻ussian Artists in Exile: Representation of the Soviet Past In Industrial Ruinscapes鈥, Year Two PhD Symposium, 91自拍 Institute of Art, London (May 2024)
鈥楬aunted Soviet: Postmemory and the Resonance of a Toxic Past in Contemporary Russian Art鈥, panel Resisting Imperialism through Decolonisation, BASEES,听Cambridge听(April 2024)
Publications & Criticism
Forthcoming: Konyushikhina, Elena. 鈥Metageography as Displacement: Three Russian Artists,鈥 accepted for publication in Slavonica, 2026.听
Forthcoming: Konyushikhina, Elena. 鈥淥ld Legacies, New Forms: Reimagining the Marxist Display in 2010s Moscow.鈥 In Refracting Soviet Memories Through Art: The Weaponisation ofHistory in Contemporary Russia and Beyond, edited by Kitty Brandon-James, Elena Konyushikhina and Sarah Wilson. London: Routledge, 2026.听
of 麓73-23麓 exhibition, ‘Russian Artists Exiled in a Loop,’听Art Focus Now听(December 2023)
, ‘Granova wrestles with the Soviet past,’ Art Focus Now听(September 2023)
, selected publications (2021-2022)
, selected publications (2017-2018)
, selected publications (2017-2019)
Konyushikhina, Elena. Play 鈥.鈥 In the Start II: Images Into Words (Magazine by the class of Kimberly Bradley), edited by听Andrea Kopranovic, 37鈥45. Salzburg: Summer Academy, 2017.
Konyushikhina, Elena. 鈥淎nton Mauve. Sheep in the Forest.鈥 In The Last Quarter: An Alternative Guide to the State Pushkin Museum of Fine听Arts, edited by Dieter Roelstraete, 21. Moscow: V-A-C, 2017.
Ganicheva, Varvara, Konyushikhina, Elena, and Smoliakova, Ekaterina.听Art Nouveau Furniture. Catalogue.听Moscow: Art Deco Museum,听2015.
Konyushikhina, Elena. 鈥淔eminism Concept.鈥 In the Actual vocabulary of Feminist Art, edited by Ilmira Bolotyan and Maria Vinnik, 130-133. Moscow: Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, 2015.
Curatorial Projects
Founder of Youtube channel , London-Moscow (2019鈥2020)
The Family Archive, Theater am Steg, Baden, Austria (May-June 2018)
Alex Khatkevich: 44 Glass Syringes with Novocain, Triangle Independent Curatorial Studio, Moscow (June 2016)
Voices, A3 Gallery, Moscow (October鈥揘ovember 2015)
Additional projects
Femme F(r)iction, Academy Mansion, New York (May 2023), research, editing and writing
Inside the Vortices. Olya Leontieva, 25 Kadr Gallery, Moscow (November鈥揊ebruary 2020)
Mementos, Deptford Does Art, London (June 2019)
Sleep In The Red Tower. Solo exhibition of Evgeniya Nozhkina. 25 Kadr Gallery, Moscow (January-February 2019)
About Me, Please, About Me, 25 Kadr Gallery, Moscow, 6th Moscow International Biennale for Young Art. Parallel program听(July 2018)
Starting Point, CCI Fabrica, Moscow, 5th Moscow International Biennale for Young Art. Parallel program, Moscow (July 2016)
Happy New Year! Solo show, Alexander Anoufriev. Triangle Independent Curatorial Studio, Moscow (December 2015)
Good Night, Vadim Sidur Museum, Moscow (May 2015)
Academic Service
Chair: Panel London Between the Mediterranean and the Baltic, Metropolitan Crossings: Art, Displacement, and the Making of Modern London (1930s鈥1970s), Symposium, Ben Uri Gallery and Museum, London (November 2025)听
Chair: Panel Soviet Women in Political Activism: State Organisations and Dissident Movements, ICCEES XI World Congress, University College London, Institute of Education (July 2025)
Co-organiser,听The Weaponisation of History: Refracting Soviet Memories in Contemporary Russia and Beyond,听91自拍, London (June 2025)
Co-organiser, The 91自拍 Second Year PhD Symposium, 91自拍, London (May 2024)
Co-organiser, Workshop on Writing Abstracts and Delivering Presentations with Josie Dixon, 91自拍, London (May 2024)
Awards &听Grants
- Edward Said Scholarship (2025-2026)
- 91自拍 Scholarship (2022-2024)
- 91自拍 Travel Grant (2024)
- Association for Art History Scholarly Research Grant (2023)
- Chevening Scholarship (2018-2019)
- International Summer Academy of Fine Arts Scholarship, Salzburg (2017)
- Travel Grant, Moscow Goethe Institute, Berlin (2016)
