Maria Naidyonova
- Anna Lilli Garai
- 2 days ago
- 1 min read
Maria Naidyonova is a Berlin-based painter and draughtswoman, born in Ukraine. She works with figurative scenes taken from everyday life, focusing on people, body language, and small moments between them. Her images show couples, friends, rivals, or strangers in close, often slightly tense situations.
She studied book graphics in Kyiv, painting at the National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture, and later completed a master’s degree at the Weissensee Academy of Art in Berlin.
Drawing is the starting point of her process. She makes fast sketches from life, then builds larger works through layering, repetition, and improvisation.
Her practice is organized in long-term series. Friends & Lovers looks at intimacy and emotional closeness. Berliners comes from daily encounters in the city, often with dry humor and sharp observation. Rivals focuses on charged relationships without giving a clear story or outcome.
She works with pencil, ink, charcoal, acrylic, and oil on paper and canvas. Figures are built through line and movement first, color and surface later. Gestures, posture, and distance between bodies carry most of the meaning.
Naidyonova has exhibited in Germany, France, Greece, Italy, Ukraine, and the United States. Recent projects include 12 Rooms with Kewenig Gallery, a solo show at Feinart Berlin, Paper Positions with The Gallery by La Lüpertz, and first prize at the Copy/Paste competition by The Curators Gallery. She also works with animation, using the same interest in timing and human interaction in moving images.
