HALYNA VAKULENKO
Visual Artist | Oil Painting | Photography
Canada
Contemporary practice exploring landscape as a perceptual construct shaped by memory, light, and lived experience.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Halyna Vakulenko's artistic practice explores landscape not as representation, but as a perceptual field where memory, emotion, and time converge. Drawing from her own photographic archives of travel and lived environments, she creates painterly works that transform observed reality into atmospheric and chromatic experiences.
Rooted in a post-impressionist tradition while embracing a contemporary visual language, her work investigates light as both a material presence and a structural force. Rather than merely illuminating the image, light becomes an active agent of transformation, reshaping perception and emotional experience. Sea, sky, and land emerge as spaces of contemplation where memory and sensation continuously evolve.
Her paintings move progressively from observation toward interpretation, allowing representation to dissolve into atmosphere, rhythm, and resonance.
ARTISTIC APPROACH
Each painting begins with direct observation and personal experience before undergoing a gradual process of transformation. Photographic reference serves as a point of departure rather than a destination, giving way to a painterly language in which atmosphere, color, and gesture become primary vehicles of meaning.
The practice is structured around five interconnected themes:
Perceptual phenomenologyMemory as a spatial and temporal structureLandscape as an emotional and experiential fieldLight as a generative principle of transformationEmotional resonance through color and atmosphere
BIOGRAPHY
Halyna Vakulenko is a Canadian visual artist and photographer of Ukrainian origin whose work investigates the transformation of lived experience into perceptual and painterly space. Born in Russia to Ukrainian parents, she was raised in Ukraine and now lives and works in Canada, where her multicultural journey continues to shape her artistic vision.
Since 2016, she has studied under artist Hervé Teboul at Studio ARTEBOUL (Montreal), where she developed a strong foundation in post-impressionist painting and contemporary approaches to landscape.
Alongside her artistic career, she practices as a cardiologist. This dual vocation has cultivated a profound sensitivity to fragility, temporality, and the invisible rhythms of living systems—qualities that quietly inform the emotional and visual language of her paintings.
Her paintings and photographs have been exhibited in Canada and France and have been presented in several international competitions. Through light, color, and atmosphere, she seeks to create works that transcend geographical boundaries and invite universal emotional reflection.
LANGUAGES
Ukrainian, Russian, French, English, and functional Spanish. Currently learning Italian and beginning Mandarin Chinese to deepen cultural exchange through future international artistic collaborations.
SELECTED SERIESInfinity BayNew HorizonsSongs of the SunAndean SpiritFuji: A Promise in Bloom
EXHIBITIONS & RECOGNITION
Galerie Ambigu (Canada, 2025–2026)
Art in Cantal (France, 2025)
Galerie Lenoir (Canada, 2026)
Invited Jury Member
Symposium Courant d'Art
Ville de Candiac, Québec, Canada
June 2026 (Outdoor symposium cancelled due to severe weather conditions.)
Arte Laguna Prize
International Competition Participant
2025, 2026
CLOSING STATEMENT
Through painting, Halyna Vakulenko explores landscape as a living space where memory, light, and perception intersect. Her work invites viewers into a contemplative experience in which the visible world becomes a reflection of inner transformation, revealing the quiet dialogue between place, time, and human emotion.
