Vilnius Academy of Arts
Specialisms: Photography / Installation/Sculpture / Set Design - Stage Screen Dance
Location: Vilnius, Lithuania
First Name: Kseniya
Last Name: Khamiankova
Specialisms: Photography / Installation/Sculpture / Set Design - Stage Screen Dance
Sectors:
My Location: Vilnius, Lithuania
University / College: Vilnius Academy of Arts
Course / Program Title: scenography (theater & cinema)
Kseniya Khamiankova (theatricalhunt) is a visual artist and scenographer based in Vilnius,
working at the intersection of scenography, fine art photography, and spatial installation,
exploring the transformation of theatrical language - mask, costume, mise-en-scène -
beyond the boundaries of the traditional stage. At the centre of her practice is the
investigation of liminal states and the anxiety that arises from the destabilization of everyday
space. Between 2024 and 2026, at the Vilnius Academy of Arts, she created a project "Unsettling
Interpretations Beyond the Theatrical Stage,
" based on Franz Kafka's "The Metamorphosis,"
presented as a photo-series and spatial installation at the VDA Library (2026). Her work has
also been shown at the Prague Quadrennial (2019), Panemunė Castle (2022), Kaunas State
Puppet Theatre (2023), and the Theatre and Cinema Museum in Vilnius (2024).
It's a photographic installation based on Franz Kafka's novella The Metamorphosis. It is not an illustration of the text and not a retelling of Gregor Samsa's story. It transfers the central state of the novella - the experience of a person who has become a stranger in their own home - from the literary page into a real physical space.I am interested in moments when one medium begins to act by the rules of another - when photography works by the logic of cinema and theatre, when a wall starts to function as a page, when a corridor starts to function as time. I do not want to explain anxiety. I want to build the conditions in which the viewer can meet it on their own - or meet something else entirely. The work does not give a ready-made reading. It gives space for reflection. The project was shot in an abandoned apartment on Bokšto Street in the Old Town of Vilnius. The apartment had stood empty for many years: peeling walls, dirty windows, Soviet furniture, the smell of stopped time. I did not need to build a set - the space was already speaking the language of Kafka.
A photoalbum "The Metamorphosis, " - part of my project "Unsettling Interpretations Beyond the Theatrical Stage" which includes installations, videos, a series of 30 photographs, and postcards.This album - the quieter, more intimate form of the same work. The project was shot in an abandoned apartment on Bokšto Street in the Old Town of Vilnius. The apartment had stood empty for many years: peeling walls, dirty windows, Soviet furniture, the smell of stopped time. I did not need to build a set - the space was already speaking the language of Kafka.