PARIS.- The winner of the Her Art Prize for international women artists - launched at the initiative of Marie Claire in partnership with Boucheron - is Galerie Continua artist Zhanna Kadyrova. On Saturday 5 April 2025, she will receive 30,000 euros from Boucheron in addition to benefiting from a domestic and international promotional campaign orchestrated by Marie Claire and Art Paris.

This international prize launched this year rewards both a bold body of work that pushes back the limits and the career of a committed woman artist chosen from among a shortlist of 12 artists exhibiting at Art Paris.

The winner was selected by a prestigious jury comprising personalities from the arts and creative industries presided over by French actor Elodie Bouchez. This year’s Her Art Prize was awarded to Zhanna Kadyrova.

Kadyrova was born in Ukraine in 1981, a country where she still lives and works today. She received an academic art education in the sculpture department of the Taras Shevchenko State Art School in Kyiv and, from the start of her career, worked across a wide range of different disciplines: sculpture, photography, video and performance art. She principally focusses on the exhibition space and the immediate surroundings of her creations, questioning the context in relation to the ongoing march of history. Kadyrova works with local building materials, such as glass, tiles and cement, from which she creates objects and site-specific interventions.

During the Orange Revolution of 2014, she was a member of “R.E.P.” (Revolution Experimental Space), whose artists carried out militant performances and produced politically committed art. Having chosen to stay in Ukraine after the Russian invasion, her current production is in direct reaction to this invasion and an expression of civil resistance. It bears witness to her resilience in the face of armed conflict.

Her series Refugees (2023), presented at Art Paris by Continua as part of the “Out of Bounds” themed focus by guest curator Simon Lamunière, documents the interior of public buildings that have been disfigured by bombs. Devoid of people and any tangible elements, only plant pots remain to remind the viewer of how life once was.

Zhanna Kadyrova has exhibited at numerous biennales and in museums around the world: Kochi-Muziris Biennale (India, 2023), Bangkok Art Biennale (Thailand, 2022), as part of international projects at the 56th and 58th Venice Biennale, as well as the Ukrainian pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale and the Kyiv Biennial in 2017 amongst others.

Her work has been widely exhibited, including at the Kunstverein Hannover (Germany); Stavanger Museum (Norway); Kunstforum Wien (Austria); Eretz Istael Museum, Tel-Aviv (Israel); Centre Pompidou and Palais de Tokyo, Paris (France); Ludwig Museum, Budapest (Hungary); PinchukArtCentre, Kyiv (Ukraine); and the Castello di Rivoli Museo D’Arte Contemporanea in Turin (Italy). Zhanna Kadyrova has just been awarded the Shevchenko National Prize and is the first woman in twenty years to have received this distinction.

Art Paris fair director Guillaume Piens said, « The new Her Art Prize continues the work that Art Paris has been undertaking for several years with the aim of increasing the visibility of women artists. In 2019, Art Paris was one of the first fairs to devote a focus to women artists in France in partnership with Camille Morineau and her association AWARE (Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions). At Art Paris 2025, 40% of the 990 artists presented by exhibiting galleries are women. The winner of the Her Art Prize, Zhanna Kadyrova, like the other shortlisted finalists, all share a common commitment that is expressed both in their art and daily lives. They explore the current times by addressing subjects such as the representation of women (Sama Alshaibi, Mari Katayama, Oda Jaune, Agnès Thurnauer), our relationship to nature and the living world (Kiki Smith, Suzanne Husky, Mathilde Rosier, Evi Keller), resistance to war (Zhanna Kadyrova) and its destruction (Thu Van Tran), the impact of modern technology on the environment (Gillian Brett), not forgetting trans identity and the lack of visibility of minorities (Maty Biayenda). »