New Artists New Era
Anna Veriki
Anna Vereshchaka, known professionally as Anna Veriki, is a Ukrainian artist whose practice operates in a space where corporeality, the animal realm, and primary emotion converge within a refined and direct visual language. Born in Chernihiv and currently based in Kyiv, her work is built upon a continuous investigation
into primordial states of being: those that precede narrative, cultural ornamentation, and complex symbolic mediation.
Working primarily with painting and graphic techniques on canvas, Vereshchaka develops a restrained aesthetic that incorporates elements of the naïve not as a gesture of innocence, but as a deliberate strategy of reduction. This formal simplification allows the image to concentrate on its essential emotional charge, eliminating anything that might distract from or soften the viewer’s direct experience.
The concept of primordiality occupies a central position in her practice. For the artist, the primordial does not refer to a historical or mythological origin, but to a fundamental psychological condition: an unconditioned state defined by simple emotions and binary tensions, where the world can still be read in terms of black and white. Visually, this perspective is translated into the recurring use of monochrome, which intensifies the narrative force and underscores the raw, immediate character of each scene.
The presence of animals in her work functions as an emblem of absolute sincerity. In contrast, the human body— often depicted nude—appears as an assertion of conscious vulnerability. These figures, however, should not be understood as self-portraits. In Vereshchaka’s work, nudity operates on both a literal and metaphorical level: it is the manifestation of radical openness, comparable to the very act of exposing a work of art to the world.
Her pictorial process privileges the unfinished, the expressive, and the impulsive. Rather than pursuing a closed or polished image, the artist preserves on the surface the traces of gesture and initial emotion, as if painting were functioning as a direct channel between inner experience and the visual plane. This quality keeps the work in a state of active tension, open to multiple readings and personal resonances.
Anna Vereshchaka’s work is part of Ukraine’s state collection, within the holdings of the National Art Gallery, and is also included in international private collections. Beyond institutional recognition, however, her practice is distinguished by strong conceptual coherence and sustained emotional honesty. Within the context of New Artist | New Era, her work asserts an artistic position that rejects spectacle in favor of the essential, reminding us that the power of contemporary art may reside in reduction, exposure, and the capacity to return to what is most human and elemental.
“I work from a primordial state, where emotion is raw, unconditioned, and divided into black and white.”
Anna Vereshchaka focuses on depicting animals and the human body in combination with naïve elements. Her practice explores the theme of primordiality. As the artist explains, “for me, primordiality is something at the beginning, basic settings, simple emotions. It is a state unburdened by circumstances. It is something that can be divided into black and white.”
For Vereshchaka, animal subjects represent sincerity. She portrays the naked human body as an image of openness toward the viewer and, importantly, not as a self portrait. “My nudity in the works is both literal and metaphorical. When an artist shows their work, they expose themselves to the viewer,” she states.
Anna works predominantly in monochrome, which reinforces the narrative intensity of her compositions. “I like to present an intermediate, expressive, raw thought, as if transferring an emotion directly onto the canvas,” the artist explains.
