Lizaveta German

Curator and art historian. Co-founder of The Naked Room, Kyiv. Co-curator of the Ukrainian Pavilion, 59th La Biennale di Venezia.

Lizaveta received her MA degree in Art History at the National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture in Kyiv. In 2016, she received a PhD degree in Art History there.

In 2008–2012 she worked as an art manager at several institutions in Kyiv, including Ludmila Bereznitska Gallery, Eidos Arts Foundation, Arts Management agency and Kyiv Sculpture Project. Between 2009 and 2017, she was contributing as an art critic to several Ukrainian media, such as Ukrainska Pravda, Korydor, LB.UA and YourArt. In 2012 she participated at Young Curators Workshop at 7th Berlin Biennial. In 2012–2013 she participated in the Curatorial Platform program at PinchukArtCentre.

Since 2014, Lizaveta has been working with Maria Lanko as a curatorial collective. The duo organised more than 30 exhibitions and collaborated with the leading art institutions in Ukraine, including National Art Museum of Ukraine, Mystetskyi Arsenal, Goethe-Institut, British Council, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Ukrainian Institute. In 2015, they opened a show in Badischer Kunstverein Karlsruhe, as a part of Kyiv Biennial–School of Kyiv project. In 2015, together with Olha Balashova she published a book The Art of Ukrainian Sixties (republished in English in 2021). In 2016 she was placed as a curator-in-residence at Liverpool Biennial, supported by British Council Ukraine. In 2017 they co-edited Decommunised: Ukrainian Soviet Mosaics book. The same year Maria and Lizaveta co-curated (together with Kateryna Filyuk) Festival of Young Ukrainian Art at Mystetskyi Arsenal, the first all-Ukrainian biennial for contemporary art under the state support. In 2015–2021 they tailored and supervised Contemporary Art educational programme for artists and art managers at Kyiv Academy of Media Arts (together with Olha Balashova). Since 2020, Maria and Lizaveta have been teaching at Skvot.IO on-line school, System of Contemporary Art course.

In 2021 their project with the artist Pavlo Makov (co-curated by Borys Filonenko), Fountain of Exhaustion. Acqua Alta was chosen to represent Ukraine at 59th La Biennale di Venezia. Beside the national pavilion, in 2022 Lizaveta co-curated Piazza Ucraina project and Decolonising Art. Beyond the Obvious interdisciplinary programme as part of International Art Exhibition.

In 2022 she presented the National Pavilion of Ukraine at Harvard, supported by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Community Renewal Fund, the Davis Center for Eurasian Studies, the Harvard Art Museums, and the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute.