Victoria Valentinovna Lomasko

Victoria Valentinovna Lomasko (Russian: Виктория Валентиновна Ломаско) is a Russian graphic artist who was born in Serpukhov, Russia in 1978 through the means of murals and graphic art in literature. To create her work, Lomasko travels throughout the former Soviet Union and spends time with those who are rarely represented in the media. She was working and living in Moscow until Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Early life Lomasko was born in Serpukhov, Russia in 1978. Her father worked as an agitprop artist at a secretive metal-worker factory. At 19 years old she moved to Moscow and attended Moscow State University of Printing Arts, where she graduated in 2003 and received her bachelor's degree in book design and graphic art. She also took classes at the Moscow Institute of Contemporary Art.

Volunteer work Lomasko visited Mozhaysk Juvenile Prison for the first time in August 2010 as a volunteer for the Center for Prison Reform. During her visits there, she taught the inmates to draw. She continued to teach drawing classes at girl's penitentiaries in Novy Oskol and Ryazan, and the boy's penitentiary in Aleskin until 2014.

That same year she co-authored the book titled The Provinces in collaboration with former political journalist Anton Nikolayev. The book was inspired by a trip to the provinces on which they went. She went on to co-author a second book with Nikolayev titled Forbidden Art. The book is a 158-page documentary graphic novel that documents the legal trial of the organizers of the Forbidden Art 2006 exhibition that was held at Andrei Sakharov Museum in Moscow in 2007. Forbidden Art was published by Boomkniga Publishers in St. Petersburg and was nominated for the 2010 "Media Art Project of the Year" Kandinsky Prize.

2012 In 2012, Lomasko's drawings began to be exhibited in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and all over Europe. She participated in shows like "Occupy Abay". Around the same time, she collaborated with Nadia Plungian to curate The Feminist Pencil, an exhibit that showcased mostly Russian women's graphic art.

2017 In 2017 Lomasko created two solo exhibitions that were shown in The United States. The first, Other Russias: Angry, was displayed at the Ellis Gallery, in Carnegie Mellon University in collaboration with the University of Pittsburgh The 320-page book consists of two sections: the first section, Invisible, focuses on the experiences of marginalized groups prior to the 2012 protests. In Lomasko's own words "Invisible contains stories about juvenile prison wards, teachers and pupils at rural schools, migrant workers, old people seeking refuge in Russian Orthodoxy, sex workers, and single women in the Russian hinterlands."

2018 In 2018 Lomasko produced two solo exhibitions that were displayed in the United Kingdom. The first titled Apparition of the Last Soviet Artist was shown at GRAD, Somerset House in London, In June 2025, she gave an interview to Industrial Worker magazine about the book. During the conversation, Lomasko also shared her political activism against the Russian and Belarusian governments, as well as stories from her personal life.

2022 After the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Lomasko fled Russia for Brussels, Belgium. This period coincided with promotion of her latest book in Europe and an exhibit based on it in Brescia, Italy, as part of Brescia's Festival For Peace.

Books

The Provinces - 2010 Forbidden Art - 2010 Other Russias - 2017 The Last Soviet Artist - 2021

Work in public collections and magazines Lomasko's work can also be found in public collections at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid, Spain; National Center of Contemporary Art in Moscow, Russia; the Arsenal Gallery in Bialystok, Poland, but also Manchester, Brescia, and Angoulême.