Born 1989 in Kiev, Ukraine, Anastasiya Tarasenko moved to New York City with her family at 6

years of age and has resided there ever since. She attended art schools early on and

ultimately received her MFA from the New York Academy of Art in 2017. She lives and works

in Sunset Park, Brooklyn.

Artist's Statement:

I like to think of what I do as social critique; it's sharp, it's biting, and it’s aimed at everyone.

The images themselves, however, are often pastoral, convivial, and humorous in the way I

compose them. This reflects the true dichotomy of existence, that we are all things at once,

existing simultaneously with joy and pain, innocence and perversion, etc. It is my self

appointed task as an artist to observe and report these inescapable truths, much in the

same way a court jester is given special dispensation to mock his powerful patrons. But far

from being an aloof observer, I’m probably hardest on myself. With the same, harsh bite, I

make self-portraits with words and images that sting me personally every day. In a sense, I

want to show you, the viewers, that I am complicit too.