Olga Fradina is a generative artist and interior designer living in Kyiv, Ukraine. Her work is characterized by abstract and biomorphic forms as well as an exploration of emotional states. Her creative programming work has been exhibited internationally at Verse, Unit London, and Hodlers, and her interior design projects have been published in publications such as Dezeen, Architectural Digest and Elle Decoration. Fradina studied Graphic Design at the Kyiv Art and Industrial Institute.

Jordan Kantor: Hi, Olga. Thank you very much for taking the time to speak with us here on the occasion of the release of Naïve as a Curated project. Before we get to your most recent work, can you take us back a bit to how you first got into making art?

Olga Fradina: I’ve been drawing for as long as I can remember. My childhood career dreams were always about creative fields. I was constantly attending a variety of art classes and reading books about artists. Eventually, I went to school to study graphic design but I also enjoyed math and science. To be honest, I had always been resistant to them, and in high school, I stopped taking classes and instead focused on drawing, mistakenly believing that an artist doesn’t need all that. 

At the same time, I’ve always had a good relationship with technology. And even though computers were rare when I was growing up, at the age of twelve I surprised my parents by easily connecting our first video recorder (VCR) to the television. Professionally, my first job was in the design department of a major newspaper. I started as an assistant, helping the programmers publish the digital version of the paper. What attracted me the most was scanning and processing photos for the website. Back then, it wasn’t a digital workflow, and photographers would bring us analog film, which we scanned and prepared for printing, sometimes experimenting with collage. After work, I would often stay and scan my own negatives and then experiment in Photoshop with post-processing. 

After working at the newspaper, I had a brief stint running a photo studio, which eventually evolved into interior design work, marking the beginning of my career in that field. In my early time working, I especially liked using the 3-D programs to make digital drawings and selecting work for the spaces we were designing.

JK: Making interior design mockups seems like a really interesting way to explore the intersections between physical and digital spaces. How did you move from those first forays into natively digital, and then generative, art?

OF: I made my first digital art when I worked at the newspaper in 1998. I took photographs on film, scanned them, and experimented with post-processing. Even while doing interior design, I’ve always been involved in the graphic aspects. When the first digital tablet pens came out, I immediately started using them for drawing, creating graphic works, and my designer friends often decorated their interiors with them. So, in one way or another I have always been involved with digital art.

JK: And how did you move from those works to discover the blockchain as a medium for your art?

OF: As an interior designer, and even with professional success, I felt a lack of freedom to express myself, so I was always doing something creative for myself in my free time: painting, ceramics, and experimenting with digital art. In 2021, I started seeing publications about NFTs and just loved the idea. I thought it would be a good way to realize becoming a digital artist and to incorporate the practice of interior design.

For my first NFT, I decided to create procedural 3D graphics, a topic that greatly interests me. But while I was just getting started, Russia launched the war in Ukraine. and my whole world turned upside down. The only goal was to survive the madness, even when sometimes it felt like it didn’t matter anymore. After the Russian army withdrew from Kyiv, and the bombings every half hour dissipated, I began to try to resume my work as an artist. It was difficult at first, but it was the only thing that could keep me going.

Around this time, I came across the work of generative artists without fully understanding what it was or how it was done. It deeply resonated with me–it’s hard for me to say why, it was a kind of intuitive attraction. I started to delve more into it, but was initially discouraged by what I thought was my lack of coding skill. I’ve always avoided math and programming, in a way limiting myself to a procedural approach, but eventually my interest won out. I found a Javascript tutor, and it was like all the puzzle pieces suddenly fit together: math, programming, art. I regret that I wasted so much time trying to avoid math previously. Now I’m working to get myself up to speed! So far, my approach to generative art is emotional and feels somewhat naïve. I think that will gradually change. I’m really curious to see where this journey takes me.

JK: It sounds like things have been moving very quickly for you. Can you outline a bit about how your creative process has evolved over time?

OF: When I decided to devote myself entirely to digital art, I wanted to get involved in procedural 3D graphics. I have been interested in this area for a long time, and it resonated with my work as an interior designer. But the more I immersed myself in it, the more my interest in generative art grew. I gradually began to study Touch Designer and subsequently code. But it’s difficult for me to stop at just one thing; I’m interested in all these tools. Now I’m more focused on learning and exploring code. This is the basis of everything. I think that over time this will all become intertwined in my practice.

JK: You have mentioned the centrality of your work in interior design. Can you talk a bit about how this work and your independent art practice relate to each other?

OF: My artistic practice is somewhat different from my design practice. In my early interiors, I often used active color solutions. But over time, I came to monochrome interiors based on combinations of complex and deep color palettes and natural materials that I find more calming. And although for my artistic practice, I also prefer monochrome and textured works, I often allow myself more emotional range. This is also an important part of who I am, and I want to explore this aspect.

JK: It’s always really interesting to see what bracketing off the work you do as art can afford. Thank you for sharing that. To the work at hand, now. Please tell us a bit about your project for Art Blocks.

OF: My project is called Naïve. It’s dedicated to a movement of Ukrainian primitivists like Maria Primachenko (1909-1997). When I was working on this project, I wasn’t only inspired by color palettes and imagery, but also identified myself as a naïve artist who creates with feelings and emotions. Many generative artists have come into the space from related fields, almost all of them have a lot of programming experience. I, on the other hand, have a lot of experience in different artistic fields, but very little experience in programming. Now I’m in this great period of time where you can “play outside the rules,” act emotionally and intuitively, and sometimes make quite bold decisions. Though this period may soon pass, and will likely be replaced by a more mature approach, I see it as having some value now.

My creative approach is always exploratory. I experiment a lot, and when I find an image that resonates to me emotionally, I use that as a starting point. Originally this project was a little bit different, and the folder in which I kept the initial outputs was called “Graphics.” They were black and white sketches that looked like pencil drawings. But there was something missing from it, and I decided to add some colored strokes. That was the turning point moment when the project began to go in another direction.

And as it often happens when working with code, I made a small mistake and the color started laying down differently than I had intended. It created a completely unexpected effect that ultimately played an important role in the final aesthetic of the project. I experimented a lot with proportions and the results reminded me of a folk art aesthetic. I’m also interested in thinking about why we’ve always had such an affinity for art. What motivated early humans to make cave paintings? It didn’t seem to make much practical sense to me, but this work holds my interest. I can spend hours looking at ancient jewelry and everyday objects. Those objects that are sometimes called “folk art” eventually became recognized in their own right and had a tremendous impact on the history of art in the early 20th century: the relationship between the work of Pablo Picasso and African art is just one example. As it relates to this project, I was at one time very interested in drawings of indigenous Australian peoples. They look generative in some ways. It’s a big and interesting subject for me.

At some point, I had a hard time getting away from the original idea of doing a Graphics project and I used a lot of neutral palettes. But, after taking a break and looking at the project with new eyes, I realized I was missing something. Even though many of the images resonated with me, I wasn’t satisfied with the overall mood and updated the palettes, with specific references to Maria Primachenko’s work. And that’s when everything started to fall into place.

JK: Many artists describe how unintended effects often take a project in a new, and better direction. Thank you for sharing how the creative process of this project developed along this cascade. What should collectors look for in the series as it is revealed?

OF: I am a supporter of abstract art, and feel quite close to Abstract Expressionism, especially as it relates to an attempt to convey an artist’s inner world and emotional experience. It has always been difficult for me to convey my emotions and feelings in words, so use art as one way to speak. I like that with abstraction, each viewer can find their own interpretation or something close to themselves. I’m always interested when collectors or artist friends write up the associations with what they saw in my work. This can yield very unexpected things, sometimes even revealing to me some of my thoughts, which, while not obvious to me at the upper level of consciousness at the time, must have been present subconsciously.

JK: Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this work, Olga. As we wrap up, are there any recent accomplishments you’d like to share–and what is the best way for people to follow your work?

OF: Honestly, the entire last year feels like one continuous achievement. I’m really excited about the fact that my generative work has received recognition in the space and among galleries, and am very grateful to everyone who has supported me along this path. In terms of keeping up: I plan to start a website dedicated to my art in the near future (the current one is focused on interior design), but I share what I am up to on X at @Olga_f2727, so you can follow me there!