Born in Belarus in 1978, Helen Shulkin earned a Specialist Diploma in Fine Arts and Drawing (specialization: Folk Arts and Crafts) from the Belarusian State Pedagogical University named after Maksim Tank (BSPU), Minsk (2001). Since 2020, she has lived and worked in Hamburg, Germany.

STATEMENT

In the interstitial space where human anatomy converges with architectural form, I explore a shared essence: structures shaped by impact, rupture, and restoration. My works do not represent specific places; they operate as dissections—opening surfaces to reveal sinews, vessels, and tissues of the built environment.

This is not a metaphor for its own sake, but a material method. Working primarily in oil on canvas, alongside incision-based works on paper, I treat painting as an operation: layering, exposing, and re-stitching. Concrete turns intimate, steel becomes porous, and architecture begins to register as a living entity rather than a static frame.

By refusing the boundary between body and building, I propose the city as an extension of embodied experience—where space is not inert, but felt. The works become maps of the human condition, inscribed into scarred matter.

EDUCATION

2001 Fine Arts and Drawing (specialization: Folk Arts and Crafts), Specialist Diploma, Belarusian State Pedagogical University named after Maksim Tank (BSPU), Minsk, Belarus

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS

2025 NORDWESTKUNST, Kunsthalle Wilhelmshaven, Wilhelmshaven, Germany (nominated)
2025 48th Art Prize of the Cultural Foundation of Sparkasse Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe, Germany (nominated)
2025 The Shape it Takes, Galerie Grolman, Berlin, Germany
2025 Structures, KURA Gallery, Hamburg, Germany (two-person exhibition)
2024 Future Perfect, Durden and Ray Gallery, Los Angeles, US
2023 FORWARD, Von Fraunberg Art Gallery & Taylor Wessing, Düsseldorf, Germany
2023 Unheimlich.Grossartig, Atelierhaus Darmstadt, Darmstadt, Germany
2022 Moving Cities: a changing metropolis, Anise Gallery, London, UK (two-person exhibition)
2021 Inspire, D-Contemporary Gallery, London, UK
2021 Solo exhibition within the framework of the KinoHafen forum, Kommunales Kino METROPOLIS, Hamburg, Germany (funded by the Hamburg Ministry of Culture and Media)
2020 OSTEN Biennial of Drawing, National Gallery of North Macedonia, Skopje, North Macedonia (nominated)
2020 Cultivate Presents, Cultivate Gallery, London, UK
2018 Solo exhibition of prize-winning artists (OSTEN Biennial of Drawing), Gallery OSTEN, Skopje, North Macedonia
2017 Great Escapes, Nude Tin Can Gallery, St Albans, Hertfordshire, UK

ART FAIRS

2025 Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, The Summer Edition, London, UK (represented by Anise Gallery)
2024 Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, London, UK (represented by Anise Gallery)

BENEFIT / CHARITY (SELECTED)

2021 Charity auction (benefit), in cooperation with Sotheby’s and Rotary Clubs Vienna-West, Vienna, Austria

CURATORIAL PRACTICE & ACTIVISM

2020 Founder and Director, New Belarus Art (gUG), Germany — a non-profit platform supporting Belarusian artists impacted by political repression and displacement
2021 Hostages, exhibition of Belarusian protest art (curator), in cooperation with the Heinrich Böll Foundation, St. Martini Church, Braunschweig, Germany
2020 Hostages, exhibition of Belarusian protest art (curator), in cooperation with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Northern Germany (Nordkirche), St. Petri Church, Hamburg, Germany
2020 Identification, exhibition of Belarusian protest art (curator), in cooperation with the Nordkirche, St. Mary’s Church, Lübeck, Germany

NOMINATIONS & AWARDS

2025 Nomination: NORDWESTKUNST 2025, Kunsthalle Wilhelmshaven, Germany
2025 Nomination: 48th Art Prize of the Cultural Foundation of Sparkasse Karlsruhe, Germany
2020 Nomination: OSTEN Biennial of Drawing, Skopje, North Macedonia (National Gallery of North Macedonia / Gallery OSTEN)
2018 Winner: OSTEN Award (individual presentation), OSTEN Biennial of Drawing, North Macedonia (National Gallery of North Macedonia / Gallery OSTEN)
2016 Nomination: OSTEN Biennial of Drawing, Skopje, North Macedonia (National Gallery of North Macedonia / Gallery OSTEN)
2016 Nomination: Art Award of the Town of Weilburg an der Lahn, Municipal Museum, Weilburg, Germany
2016 Nomination: Art Award of the Town of Eggenstein-Leopoldshafen, Germany

PUBLICATIONS

2023 I Will Survive, Body & Soul — No. 41, Corvinus Presse, Berlin, Germany
2023 Ritmo, color y composición, The Core, Mexico City, Mexico
2020 People Have the Power, Body & Soul — No. 33, Corvinus Presse, Berlin, Germany
2020 Neue Kunst aus Belarus in der Marienkirche, Lübecker Nachrichten, 20 Nov 2020, Germany
2018 The best abstract artist of the month, The Guide Artists Magazine, Issue 14, April, Spain
2018 Cover image / feature, Office et Culture, Issue 48, Paris, France
2018 Posturbanity, ARTICULATE, Issue 15, Denmark
2017 You’ll Never Walk Alone, Body & Soul — No. 28, Corvinus Presse, Berlin, Germany
2016 Early One Morning, Body & Soul — No. 26, Corvinus Presse, Berlin, Germany

COLLECTIONS

German Literature Archive Marbach, Germany — signed original works published in Body & Soul / Corvinus Presse
Berlin State Library, Germany — signed original works published in Body & Soul / Corvinus Presse
Corporate collections (selected): Rolfe Judd (London); MATTER Architects (Auckland); Blankpage Architects (Beirut)

GALLERIES & COLLABORATIONS

Anise Gallery, London, UK
Von Fraunberg Art Gallery, Düsseldorf, Germany
MinEastry of Postcollapse Art and Culture (MPAC), Zurich, Switzerland (offspace / project space)