Olha Nekhai
Self-taught artist · Helsinki
I draw and paint ornaments by hand, and I make personal images for one person at a time, starting from the moment of their birth. Since 2025 more than thirty people who left Ukraine and other post-Soviet countries have received such images from me free of charge.
Works
Ornamental drawings and paintings, 2022–2026, and personal images made from them in 2026. The technique is stated under every image; hand-made works are shown in phone photographs.
From line to personal image
The model kept the ornament and set it between the Dnipro at Kyiv and a Finnish lake shore, adding wheat, rowan berries and a red cottage.
The model kept the drawing and added the two cities, the flags and the gold. It drew the Finnish flag with an extra stripe.
Paintings and drawings
Sheets from A4 to 60 × 40 cm; individual sizes and years were not recorded.
Method
I draw an ornament first as a line, then paint it in colour, in acrylic or gouache on paper. In 2026 some of my drawings became the starting point for personal images, each made for one person. I generate them in ChatGPT through an assistant set up for my style, starting from my own drawing or painting and from prompts I write myself, and I select every image myself.
In the personal images the skill has not gone away; it has moved. What matters there is the prompt, and the judgement to tell, in a mass of generated material, what belongs to this person and what is noise.
I state the method on every image. My rule: an AI tool receives a moment of birth and what a person chooses to tell me about their life, never their name or anything else that identifies them. Natal astrology gives me a starting grid. I make no claim about its validity; what interests me is the meeting between two people.
Project
Made for One Person
A project planned for 2027. Over one year I want to turn this practice into a body of artistic work: personal artist’s books in calendar and notebook form, each made for one participant and given to them; recorded conversations under written consent; four open workshops through the Ukrainian community in the Helsinki region; a small public showing; and documentation offered to a Finnish public collection.
Everything is given away. Nothing made in the project is sold.
About
I am from Kyiv and self-taught. The oil paintings and drawings I made before 2022 are in Kyiv, in an apartment I cannot reach. After the full-scale invasion I lived in Poland, Spain, the United States and Switzerland, and in Zürich I volunteered with a Ukrainian diaspora association. I have lived in Helsinki since March 2025, and I still draw and paint by hand. I am a member of the Ukrainian Association in Finland (Ukrainalaisten Yhdistys Suomessa ry) and of Kaivo Espoo ry.
I hold a degree in finance (1988) and worked for twenty years in Ukrainian public administration, in audit and financial oversight. I design and typeset my work myself, and I work in Ukrainian, Russian and English.
Contact
For questions about my work and the project:
olgalobenko29@gmail.com