Here should be a clear statement, summing everything up. Even what’s yet to come, if possible.

Here’s what I have to say.

Being a Belarusian feels like waking up after a head injury with a memory loss. People in the hospital room, their friendly faces hanging over you, tell you all kinds of stories about your past life(s), who you are, where you’re at. Some say you never existed in the first place, and you maybe even consider agreeing, just to have a little respite. You maybe even consider escape (obviously, into the woods), just to find out that now you might be trapped in your mind’s feverish landscapes.
 

Landscape is where I started painting. I used to go out at dawn and sunset and make dozens of fast oil studies in changing light. All failures, but that’s how I learned to use color. Nothing looks the same at any given moment – that’s as much clarity as one can get. The paintings have a sense of ambiguity, some are abstract but not quite; some are representational, but not really. The paintings dictate their own terms, and when they do, I follow. After all, there are no straight paths through the woods, and even if one is never to find a way out, one might as well take a moment and just look around.

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Daša Kulikova (b.1993 in Biarozaŭka, Belarus) earned her MFA in Painting from VCU Arts, Richmond, VA as a Fulbright scholar in 2026 and holds a BFA from Belarusian State Academy of Arts, Minsk, Belarus (2021). She is currently based in Richmond, VA where she teaches at VCU Arts.