Dimitrina Sevova experiments with different stages of clay and the fragility of the material, from handbuilt or cast ceramic or porcelain objects and vessels to sculptures and environments of ephemeral wall paintings of unfired clay. Like in alchemy, working with this material needs a mutual affinity between the artist and the material. Her work is often displayed in site-specific and contextually oriented installations, employing various additional media, from found objects, drawings, photography or video, to space and time informed by play, game and reflecting the current technological dispositives. Research is a method and way of making, drawing on scientific realism with its objective reality, which Sevova displaces by imagination to ambiguous, performative, subjective states of objects. Her works navigate between two systems, on the one hand, the representational models and their fiction, and on the other, the abstract, immaterial, and performative qualities of reality itself. Between micro and macro, a mysterious manifestation of natural and technological magic in the dark underscores poetic ecologies and earthly muds.
The motto of her practices is: deskill craft, re-skill art to reconnect thinking with making.
Pigmented porcelain objects, Bodmer C40 slip cast in matrix made by the artist, unglazed, fired at 1230 °C; platform treated with raw clay slip and ceramic pigments added by the artist to the slip; the tree is a found object, dried, painted with raw stoneware slip of dehydrated clay, smashed, with painting pigments. Dimensions variable
Detail view. Pigmented porcelain objects, Bodmer C40 slip cast in matrix made by the artist, unglazed, fired at 1230 °C; platform treated with raw clay slip and ceramic pigments added by the artist to the slip; the tree is a found object, dried, painted with raw stoneware slip of dehydrated clay, smashed, with painting pigments. Dimensions variable
Pigmented porcelain objects, Bodmer C40 slip cast in matrix made by the artist, unglazed, fired at 1230 °C; platform treated with raw clay slip and ceramic pigments added by the artist to the slip; the tree is a found object, dried, painted with raw stoneware slip of dehydrated clay, smashed, with painting pigments. Dimensions variable
Exotic X: Double charm with a color charge from the periphery
2022
Ceramic, stoneware Bodmer B128CH, glazed, fired, process-based, hand-built unique piece. Approx. 45 cm × 50 cm × 4 cm
Ceramic, stoneware Bodmer B128CH, glazed, fired, process-based, hand-built unique piece. Approx. 45 cm × 50 cm × 4 cm
Map I
2023
Ceramic, stoneware Bodmer B128CH, glazed, fired, process-based, hand-built unique piece. Approx. 45 cm × 50 cm × 4 cm
Ceramic, stoneware Bodmer B128CH, glazed, fired, process-based, hand-built unique piece. Approx. 45 cm × 50 cm × 4 cm
Hand-built of Bodmer GRX10 clay, engobe drawing, fired
Birdman, 2022
Hand-built of Bodmer GRX10 clay, engobe drawing, fired
Map II
2023
Human-Bird Head
2022
Porcelain, cast and hand-built elements with found objects attached (corals), glazed, fired to 1250 °C, partially treated with epoxy over the glaze. Set on a temporal body built of Terra 502 unfired clay, hand-built in the space
Porcelain, cast and hand-built elements with found objects attached (corals), glazed, fired to 1250 °C, partially treated with epoxy over the glaze. Set on a temporal body built of Terra 502 unfired clay, hand-built in the space
Speechless Act
2022
Ceramic, stoneware, glazed, fired, hand-built unique piece Truth is not good Truth is not abstract Truth is human Truth = Woman The philosopher desires the woman The woman is the sphinx
Ceramic, stoneware, glazed, fired, hand-built unique piece Truth is not good Truth is not abstract Truth is human Truth = Woman The philosopher desires the woman The woman is the sphinx
Nietzsche’s Truth
2023
Ming porcelain, cast, with hand-built elements, drawn with glazing pencil after bisque firing, overall transparent glaze, fired to 1220 °C, unique piece
Ming porcelain, cast, with hand-built elements, drawn with glazing pencil after bisque firing, overall transparent glaze, fired to 1220 °C, unique piece
Memento Mori
2022
Ceramic, stoneware and Ming porcelain, fired, hand-built unique piece
Ceramic, stoneware and Ming porcelain, fired, hand-built unique piece
Snake in the Garden
20232023
In the genealogy of Louise Charcoal and pigment drawing on 300g Arche paper, 76 cm × 56 cm
In the genealogy of Louise Charcoal and pigment drawing on 300g Arche paper, 76 cm × 56 cm
Every woman has her own spider(s)
2023
Charcoal and pigment drawing on 350 g Dorée paper, approx. 145 cm × 124 cm
Charcoal and pigment drawing on 350 g Dorée paper, approx. 145 cm × 124 cm
Charcoal and pigment drawing on 350 g Dorée paper, approx. 145 cm × 124 cm
Charcoal and pigment drawing on 350 g Dorée paper, approx. 145 cm × 124 cm
Forest at dusk (Investigation of Urpflanze)
2023
Other drawings and paintings
2023
Further works to be added
202x
Biography
Born Varna, Bulgaria
Education Master of Fine Arts at the Zurich University of the Arts ZHdK, Zurich
MAS Curating at the Institute for Cultural Studies in the Arts of ZHdK
Graduated in the painting class of Prof. Andrei Daniel at the National Academy of Art, Sofia
National Highschool of Fine Arts “Iliya Petrov” in Sofia, Bulgaria
Resides Lives and works in Zurich, Switzerland
Solo Exhibitions
2023 Innerfaces – Walking through the Maze, Waschhaus of
Villa Grunholzer, Uster, Switzerland
2022 Akku Kunstkiste N° 47, Uster, Switzerland, solo exhibition
when a whale is a lake, its surface reflects deep time
2019 Alien Phenomenology and the Porcelain Workshop of Things
– the fragility that forms in nature and culture, ZHdK, Zurich
2006 Digitaler Dachstock #2 under the title luncheon on the grass
– postproduction by code flow, Haus für Kunst Uri, Altdorf,
Switzerland, with code flow (Dimitrina Sevova and Alain Kessi),
curated by Martina Weber
2005 “Private” National Foods with Multinational Appetites,
performance and exhibition as part of the Diaspora Soul
Food series, Les Complices, Zurich, in collaboration with Alain Kessi
2001 Pretty Mouth and Brown My Eyes, solo exhibition at the 3rd
International Triennial of Graphic Arts in Sofia, Bulgaria, as laureate
of the Grand Prix 1998, Gallery Shipka 6
1996 Philosophy in the Boudoir, Gallery Ata-Ray, Sofia, Bulgaria;
conceptual drawings after Sade
Selected Group Exhibitions
2023 Soft Diagrams – Play and Work. (Re)Productive Turn(s)
– running after its own tail, INDUSTRA, Brno, Czech Republic.
Interwoven in the Anthropocene, Kunstraum Uster, Uster, Switzerland.
The Blood of a Poet. Meta-m-orphosis, @theOff.space,
Zurich, curated by Rocco A. de Filippo.
über natürliche kräfte, CULARTA – atelier e gallaria, Laax,
Switzerland, curated by Damian Christinger.
2022 Akku Panorama, Zeughaus Uster, Uster, Switzerland
Last words from the Periphery III, @theOff.space,
Zurich, curated by Rocco A. De Filippo
Last words from the Periphery II, @theOff.space, Zurich,
curated by Rocco A. De Filippo and Olena Iegorova
2021 Hermes Trismegistos Dreams of Futures Within Futures, or
From the Ashes of a Thousand Surrealist Fires Through
Post-Pandemic Paranoia Straight Into the Glaring Brightness of a
Thousand Dying Suns, Die Diele, Zurich, curated by Damian Christinger.
in a circle around the corner, pop-up exhibition in an industrial
space in Dübendorf, Switzerland, curated by Katerina Sedy.
2018 100 Ways of Thinking, Kunsthalle Zürich, exhibition in collaboration
with Artur Żmijewski and How to teach art?.
2014 Unsettling the Setting, Museum Bärengasse, Zurich, Switzerland,
curated by Dorothee Richter and Mirjam Bayerdörfer
(25. October 2014 - 23. November 2014)
2013 IPA Platform for Young Performance Artists Istanbul 2013 Program:
NEXT STEP, Sanatorium Project Space, Istanbul, Turkey; performance
A Lecture-Performance about the Practice of Lecture-Performance.
2008 All-About-Him, open-air exhibition in Sofia, Bulgaria, curated by Ventzislav Zankov
lost&found – Von Verlusten und Strategien der kulturellen Selbstermächtigung,
Lothringer 13 Laden in Munich, Germany, curated by Alice Cantaluppi,
Isabel Reiss and Anna Voswinckel.
2007 Lost and Found, Shedhalle, Zurich, Switzerland, curated by
Alice Cantaluppi, Isabel Reiss and Anna Voswinckel.
2006 Arteast Collection 2000+23, Museum of Modern Art Ljubljana
(Moderna galerija), Ljubljana, Slovenia (catalog).
2005 Polyphony – Collaborative Practices, Part 2, Shedhalle, Zurich,
with code flow (Dimitrina Sevova & Alan Roth).
2001 Exchanging Places, ATA Center for Contemporary Art, Sofia,
Bulgaria, curated by Maria Vassileva, travel grant and research
stay in Bucharest in preparation for the exhibition.
Crossing Over Time – 23 inspirational short films, selected
by Chris Byrne from the four editions of Crossing Over, curated by
Iliyana Nedkova. Guest project at several European video and
media festivals. (DVD and catalog)
2000 Subjets and Shadows, ATA Center for Contemporary Art, Sofia,
Bulgaria, curated by Maria Vassileva
Bulgaria, N.Y., Bulgarian and American Women Artists Collaborate,
Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts Gallery, New York, USA, curated by
Regina Khidekel and Irina Danilova, travel grant, research and
production stay in New York.
Blind Dating Technology, curated by Iliyana Nedkova for Medi@terra
2000:NEO[TECHNO]LOGISMs – the Second International Art and
Technology Festival and Symposium as part of Medi@terra 2000
Interactive Art Exhibition, Factory, Athens School of Fine Arts, Athens,
Greece, November 2000
1999 Obsession, Central Mineral Baths, Sofia, Bulgaria, curated
by Maria Vassileva, idea Alla Georgieva (catalog)
Culture/Subculture, in Municipal Art Gallery Boris Georgiev and
nightclubs Oscar Wilde and Comics, Varna, Bulgaria, curated
by Kamen Balkanski.
and many more
Public Lectures, Screenings and Presentations
2022 Oral History – Live Interviews with Performance Art Actors, curated by
Chris Regn and Dorothea Rust as part of BANG BANG – translocal hi:
stories of performance art, Museum Tinguely, Basel, Switzerland, public
interview with Dimitrina Sevova by Chris Regn and Ursula Scherrer, 30.06.2022.
2018 Public lecture Spacing Love – Decolonising Eros: The Politics of Love,
Loss and Mourning of the Plural Performative, Tensta konsthall, Stockholm,
Sweden, and CuratorLab, Konstfack, Stockholm.
2012 Sinopale 4 (Sinop Biennale), Sinop, Turkey, public screening Production
and Subversion of Subjectivity: Questions of Authenticity, Authority and
Multiplicity, and public lecture Shadow and solar individual – multiple subjectivities,
and the question of visibility in the movies of Maya Deren, Eleonor Antin,
Yvonne Rainer and Kara Walker.
2011 Seminar Artist Selfmanagement organized by Julia Sheppard and Nicole
Biermaier in the Master of Fine Arts, Zurich University of the Arts, Zurich,
Switzerland; public lecture and workshop Self-organization and self-responsibility in art
– Collaborative strategies for visibility of independent positions in creative long-term processes.
2010 art + argument, Claudia Groeflin Galerie, Zurich, Switzerland, curated by
Aoife Rosenmeyer: (When it comes to art,) we are still painting on the walls of
caves. With Giovanni Carmine, Fabian Chiquet, Morgan Falconer and Dimitrina Sevova.
2009 This Human World human-rights film festival, Schikaneder cinema, Vienna,
Austria; public screening of Unbeschreiblich weiblich with presentation by the
artist as part of the official program of the festival.
2008 lost&found – Von Verlusten und Strategien der kulturellen Selbstermächtigung,
Lothringer 13 Laden in Munich, Germany, curated by Alice Cantaluppi,
Isabel Reiss and Anna Voswinckel; public screening of Unbeschreiblich
weiblich and presentation by the artist.
2007 11 VideoMedeja, Novi Sad, Serbia; public screening of Unbeschreiblich
weiblich as part of the official program of the festival.
2006 International symposium Art – Place – Technology, Liverpool School of Art
and Design / FACT, Liverpool, United Kingdom; lecture-performance Identifications
of curatorial practices in media space. The figure of the successful media curator in
the first decade of the 21st century, with code flow (Dimitrina Sevova and Alan Kessi).
2001 International symposium Never look back – Politics of Friendship, Shedhalle
in Zurich, curated by Renate Lorenz, Marion von Osten and Elke aus dem Moore;
public lecture Women’s exhibitions – alternative models in Bulgaria.
Conference “Understanding the Balkans” in Skopje, Macedonia, curated
by Melentie Pandilovski; public lecture Fragmented and Deterritorialized
– The Balkan Patient or the Balkan Client, in collaboration with Alain Kessi.
2000 Computer Space 2000, National Palace of Culture, Sofia, Bulgaria; public lecture Virtual Identity.
Bibliography
ImAtelier.ch, Dimitrina Sevova, 2023. Interview with Dimitrina Sevova.
Chris Regn and Ursula Scherrer for BANG BANG, Oral History –
Live Interviews with Performance Art Actors: Dimitrina Sevova, Museum
Tinguely, Basel, Switzerland, 30.06.2022
Rene Beekman, Net Art in Bulgaria. The first decade, OpenArtFiles, 2021
Book of Events 2019, Plovdiv 2019 – European Capital of Culture
(Plovdiv: Plovdiv 2019 Foundation, 2019).
Ivana Sremčević Matijević, 20 years of VideoMedeja, documentary film, 2019.
Krassimir Terziev, (Self-)Tracking Shot. Film and Video in the Visual Arts in Bulgaria, 2019.
Lina Morawetz (ed.), Kunsthalle Exnergasse 2012, Kunsthalle Exnergasse, 2013.
Text by Dimitrina Sevova, and documentation of her curatorial group show and
public theoretical symposium Reality Manifestos – Can Reality Break Bricks?
Sonja Eismann (ed.), Hot Topic. Popfeminismus heute, Ventil Verlag, 2007
Allan Siegel, Curatorship, Culture and the Public: Curatorial Practice in the
Post-Soviet Age, Part I & II. In: ARTMargins (Contemporary Central & East European
Visual Culture), 2007-01-17 & 2007-05-08. Interview with Dimitrina Sevova.
Svilen Stefanov, Transformations in Bulgarian Painting in the 1990s. Postmodern
Doubt in the “Traditional Matter”?, in Albena Vacheva, Georgi Chobanov (eds.),
Culture and Criticism. Part III: The End of Modernity? (Varna: LiterNet, 2003) (in Bulgarian)
Nina Czegledy, Chris Hill and Iliyana Nedkova, Crossing Over (Liverpool: Foundation
for Art & Creative Technology, 2001).
Iara Boubnova and Luchezar Boyadjiev, The State of Video Art in Bulgaria, ArtMargins
(Contemporary art across the evolving global peripheries), 2000-09-26.
Iliyana Nedkova, Catherine Williams, Mare Tralla, Virtual Revolutions: Act and Read,
1998-2000 (Liverpool: Audio-Visual Research Editions, 2000).
Maria Vassileva, catalog of the exhibition Obsession, Central Mineral Baths, Sofia,
Bulgaria, curated by Maria Vassileva, idea Alla Georgieva (2000).
Maria Vassileva, Iara Boubnova, catalog of the exhibition Erato’s Version, Gallery
Shipka 6, Sofia, Bulgaria (Sofia: Institute of Contemporary Art, 1998) (in Bulgarian)
Publications
ImAtelier.ch, Dimitrina Sevova, 2023. Interview with Dimitrina Sevova.
Chris Regn and Ursula Scherrer for BANG BANG, Oral History –
Live Interviews with Performance Art Actors: Dimitrina Sevova, Museum
Tinguely, Basel, Switzerland, 30.06.2022
Rene Beekman, Net Art in Bulgaria. The first decade, OpenArtFiles, 2021
Book of Events 2019, Plovdiv 2019 – European Capital of Culture
(Plovdiv: Plovdiv 2019 Foundation, 2019).
Ivana Sremčević Matijević, 20 years of VideoMedeja, documentary film, 2019.
Krassimir Terziev, (Self-)Tracking Shot. Film and Video in the Visual Arts in Bulgaria, 2019.
Lina Morawetz (ed.), Kunsthalle Exnergasse 2012, Kunsthalle Exnergasse, 2013.
Text by Dimitrina Sevova, and documentation of her curatorial group show and
public theoretical symposium Reality Manifestos – Can Reality Break Bricks?
Sonja Eismann (ed.), Hot Topic. Popfeminismus heute, Ventil Verlag, 2007
Allan Siegel, Curatorship, Culture and the Public: Curatorial Practice in the
Post-Soviet Age, Part I & II. In: ARTMargins (Contemporary Central & East European
Visual Culture), 2007-01-17 & 2007-05-08. Interview with Dimitrina Sevova.
Svilen Stefanov, Transformations in Bulgarian Painting in the 1990s. Postmodern
Doubt in the “Traditional Matter”?, in Albena Vacheva, Georgi Chobanov (eds.),
Culture and Criticism. Part III: The End of Modernity? (Varna: LiterNet, 2003) (in Bulgarian)
Nina Czegledy, Chris Hill and Iliyana Nedkova, Crossing Over (Liverpool: Foundation
for Art & Creative Technology, 2001).
Iara Boubnova and Luchezar Boyadjiev, The State of Video Art in Bulgaria, ArtMargins
(Contemporary art across the evolving global peripheries), 2000-09-26.
Iliyana Nedkova, Catherine Williams, Mare Tralla, Virtual Revolutions: Act and Read,
1998-2000 (Liverpool: Audio-Visual Research Editions, 2000).
Maria Vassileva, catalog of the exhibition Obsession, Central Mineral Baths, Sofia,
Bulgaria, curated by Maria Vassileva, idea Alla Georgieva (2000).
Maria Vassileva, Iara Boubnova, catalog of the exhibition Erato’s Version, Gallery
Shipka 6, Sofia, Bulgaria (Sofia: Institute of Contemporary Art, 1998) (in Bulgarian)
Prizes and Grants
2021 One-year studio scholarship / residency, Kasernenareal Uster,
Akku Uster, with personal exhibition (2022)
2020 One-year studio scholarship, Mediacampus, Zurich, What’s
Next Studio / Z-Kubator ZHdK
1999 Grant for CD-ROM production “Adam & Eva” from SOKI
Students’ Society for Computer Art, Sofia, Bulgaria
1998 Grand Prix – 2nd International Triennial of Graphic Arts, Sofia,
Bulgaria (the award includes a personal exhibition in the frame
of the next edition of the Triennial)
1996 Drawing Award for Young Artist of the Union of Bulgarian Artists
1st Prize for Painting – 100 Years of the National Academy of Fine Arts, Sofia, Bulgaria
1994 1st Prize for Drawing of the Union of Bulgarian Artists in the competition
exhibition “Drawing” in memory of the artist Vasil Stoilov, Gallery Shipka 6, Sofia, Bulgaria
Curatorial Practices
Dimitrina Sevova’s curatorial practices are discourse oriented with a focus on group exhibition making. She has curated large-scale projects internationally and regionally, like Digital Ecologies as part of the official program of Plovdiv 2019, European Capital of Culture, across two exhibition venues, the Center for Contemporary Art ‘Ancient Bath’ and the former tobacco warehouse SKLAD in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, in 2013, the international group exhibition Creative Assemblages – When aesthetics meet the economy or what do they have in Common? at Siemens Sanat, Istanbul, Turkey, in 2012, the group exhibition and public symposium Reality Manifestos – Can Dialectics Break Bricks? at Kunsthalle Exnergasse, Vienna, and in 2005, Critique of Pure Image – Between Fake and Quotation, Centre for Contemporary Art, Plovdiv, Bulgaria, international exhibition, series of performances with 30 participating artists and collectives, theoretical symposium with 18 lectures, and openair screening of a selection of short movies on the main pedestrian street in Plovdiv, among others. In 2017 she received a curatorial research grant from Pro Helvetia for her project Endless Conversation – Spacing! On the Politics of Language and the Aesthetics of Affect – Thinking Art Beyond Representation in Contemporary Art Practices and Production.
As a young artist still at the Art Academy, she co-initiated 1997 and programmed TED in Varna, the first project space for contemporary art and new media in North-Eastern Bulgaria, which became an experimental platform for established and emerging local and international artists. During its existence, it hosted more than 94 solo and group exhibitions, lectures, performances and screenings. Later, she initiated and co-curated Communication Front (1999 / 2000 / 2001) at the Center for Contemporary Art in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, a month-long large-scale international electronic and media art project consisting of an exhibition, symposium, production workshops and various parallel events. From 2014 to 2018, she programmed of the Corner College art project space in the District 4 of Zurich, curating numerous group and personal exhibitions and events with a variety of artists, both international and established, and local or upcoming. She has collaborated with other curators on various exhibition projects including Ich Tier! (Du Mensch) – Du Tier! (Ich Mensch), a group exhibition project spanning two spaces, investigating human-animal relations, at Perla-Mode and Dienstgebäude, Zurich, co-curated with Cathérine Hug and Isabel Reiss in 2010, and Invisible City – Technologies of the Body, a collaborative long-term research project between three artists and two curators, and exhibition display at Kunstverein Zürich Wäscherei in Zurich co-curated with Işın Önol in 2012, reflecting the gentrification process in District 4 of Zurich. She also co-curated, the international public symposium The Diagrammatic Practice of the Micropolitical – the Spatio‐temporal Expression of Play between Power, Knowledge and the Aesthetics of Existence at ZHdK Zurich University of the Arts, in the context of her curatorial term 2013 at Kunsthof, Zurich, an experimental exhibition space of the Bachelor of Fine Arts of ZHdK. She was part of the curatorial team of the 4th and 5th editions of Sinopale (Sinop International Biennial, Turkey) in 2012 and 2014.