Olga Kisseleva (Киселёва, Ольга Игоревна), born in Saint Petersburg on 22 November 1965, is a Russian artist and painter who holds French citizenship. Working across installation, media and science, she has developed projects that connect digital technologies and interactive forms with public space, galleries and museums.
Key facts
- Born: 1965-11-22
- Place of birth: Saint Petersburg
- Citizenship: France
- Occupation: painter; multimedia artist
How did Kisseleva’s career develop?
In the early 1990s, an invitation from the Fulbright Foundation brought Kisseleva into a United States-based team developing digital technologies. She spent time at Columbia University and the University of California and took part in the early start-up environment of Silicon Valley.
Kisseleva teaches new media art and art and science at Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne. Between 2007 and 2009, she served on the institution’s High Scientific Committee.
What does her art explore?
Kisseleva’s practice moves between technological systems and lived environments. Her projects use forms including video, virtual reality, the web, wireless technology, performance and interactive installations. Rather than treating technology simply as a tool, her work makes it a way to examine how people encounter places, identities and the boundaries between what is real and imagined.
In Une Voyante m’a dit…, presented at the Dakar Biennale in 2002, Kisseleva exchanged gazes with participants in a public setting. The project used this encounter to consider identity and the possibility of seeing the world from another person’s perspective.
Where are you? focuses on teleobjectivity and immersion in real environments. Photographs gathered during journeys become a means of drawing attention to contrasts found across contemporary cities. In Hybrid Space, made in collaboration with the Academy of Sciences, twelve interactive installations invite viewers to explore the unstable line between reality and imagination.
Where has her work been shown?
Kisseleva’s exhibition history includes museums and contemporary art institutions in Europe, Russia and the United States, as well as biennials. Selected venues and events include:
- State Russian Museum, Saint Petersburg
- Kiasma, Helsinki
- Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid
- Centre Georges Pompidou and Fondation Cartier pour l’Art Contemporain, Paris
- Art Institute of Chicago
- Moscow Biennale (2007) and Dakar Biennale (2002)
- National Centre for Contemporary Arts, Moscow
Her projects and practice have also been the subject of publications including Where are you? (2006), CrossWorlds (2008), Hybrid Space (2002) and Nano Worlds: Custom Made (2013).
Why is Kisseleva’s practice significant?
Kisseleva’s work brings together contemporary art, scientific inquiry and communication technologies. Its movement between public settings, networks and exhibition spaces makes participation central: viewers are not only looking at an artwork but may also become part of how it operates. Across projects concerned with perspective, place and perception, technology becomes a framework for questioning how people relate to the world around them.
Frequently asked questions
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An independent reference profile prepared by intart.org from public biographical records. intart.org is not affiliated with the artist, their estate or their galleries.
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