Dmytro Chepurnyi

Dmytro Chepurnyi is an independent curator and writer based in Kyiv. He was born in 1994 in Luhansk, north of the Donetsk coal basin. He graduated from the Cultural Studies department at Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. From 2016 to 2020, he collaborated with IZOLYATSIA Foundation and coordinated Donbas Studies research project. He has been a Visiting Fellow at the University of St Andrews (UK) and a member of the group Donbas Through Collaborative Frameworks (Ukraine/UK). He is a co-author of the book Limits of Collaboration: Art, Ethics, and Donbas (2022) together with Victoria Donovan and Daria Tsymbalyuk, and a сo-author of the publication Curatorial Handbook (2020) together with Oleksandra Pogrebnyak and Kateryna Iakovlenko. He has curated various art residency programs, in particular, Landscape As a Monument (2020), Contemporary Art Rivne (2021), and When Was the Story Interrupted? (2022/2023), Ukrainian Ecologies (2024).

In 2023, I co-founded the Ukrainian Environmental Humanities Network (UEHN). Please follow our environmental activities in Ukraine here. As part of this initiative, I’m working on a special environmental issue of Solomyia Magazine, which highlights Ukraine’s ecological landscape and Ukrainian Ecologies residency programme.

Starting in 2024, I’m also working on a book Зображення Донбасу (working title), focused on the Donetsk and Luhansk art scene. Through interviews with artists, curators, and cultural professionals, I aim to preserve insider perspectives on the challenges faced by art communities in Luhansk, Donetsk, and other cities since the beginning of the Russo-Ukrainian war in 2014.

Learn more about my latest projects, writings, and interviews:

Oleksandra Pogrebnyak and Dmytro Chepurnyi on apartment exhibitions, curating with a baby, and stories against the backdrop of war – Artslooker (2024)

Dmytro Chepurnyi: ‘Culture of Ukraine’s East Will Endure as Long as Its Creators Are Alive’ – Tribun (2024)

Landscape After Deoccupation: On Imagined Possibilities of Returning to Luhansk – Blok Magazine (2023)