Elena Shkvarkina is a visual artist whose work situates painting, sculpture, sound, performance and moving image at the centre of embodied listening. Elena devises and builds sonic devices, such as the Sonic Painting Machine (SPM) and flute structures, for ritual performances Litany for Ancestral Healing and Windmill. Through these sono-somatic extensions, Elena establishes connecting pathways to her ancestral land and lineage, extending the enquiry to more-than-human knowledge systems and collective ancestral memory.

She holds an MA in Painting from the Royal College of Art (2025) and works in London.

Selected recent exhibitions and performances include Landscape - A Changed Environment (Messums West, 2026), Side Sweep (The Gramophone Works, 2025), Still Flows (RuptureXIBIT, 2025), and Calling in the Last Light (Turf Projects, MHA The Wilderness, 2025). 

She has co-curated and exhibited in collaborative projects, including The Brink (Ugly Duck, 2023) and Ancestral Utopias (Royal College of Art, 2025). The latter became SustainLab Society’s largest interdisciplinary exhibition to date, during which she served as co-director. Alongside her exhibition practice, she organises workshops, talks, and practice exchange events that champion sustainability and cross-disciplinary dialogue.

EDUCATION

2025 Royal College of Art (MA Painting)

PAST EXHIBITIONS

2026 Immemorial, S.E.E. Anew, Hypha HQ, London, 23 April - 23 May 2026

2026 Painting – A Changed Environment, Messums West, Tisbury, 17 January – 9 March 2026

2025 Side Sweep, The Gramophone Works, London, 25–28 September

2025 17 Points of Departure, Safehouse 2, London, 19-21 September

2025 Still Flows, RuptureXIBIT, London, 15-19 July

2025 The Fall of Icarus, Upper Gulbenkian Gallery, London, 7-10 May

2025 Ancestral Utopias, SustainLab (Co-curator & Artist), Hangar Gallery, London, 29 April - 2 May

2024 Pure Land, The Sky Lounge (Co-curator & Artist), Thames City, London, 25 January

2023 The Brink, group exhibition, Tiderip (Co-curator & Artist), Ugly Duck, London, 7-9 October

PERFORMANCES

Litany for Ancestral Healing & Windmill at Immemorial, Hypha HQ, 20 May 2026, London

Windmill at Painting – A Changed Environment, Messums West, 21 February 2026, Tisbury

Litany for Ancestral Healing & Windmill at Side Sweep, The Gramophone Works, 25 September 2025, London

Windmill (Wind Weaving) at Calling in the Last Light, Turf Projects, MHA The Wilderness, 6 September 2025, Croydon

Litany for Ancestral Healing at Still Flows, RuptureXIBIT, 15 - 20 July 2025, Kingston upon Thames

Litany for Ancestral Healing at Painting MA degree show, RCA Battersea Painting building, 19 & 21 June 2025, London

Litany for Ancestral Healing at Ancestral Utopias, SustainLab, RCA Hangar Gallery, 29 April - 1 May 2025, London

Articles & Media

https://www.artzip.org/the-brink

https://www.k2jewelleryacademy.london/blog/nihonga-painting-class-at-k2-academy