Valerie Skakun is a multidisciplinary artist/educator based in NYC.  She received an MFA from Hunter College of the City University of New York in 2019, and a BFA from The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art in 2009.  She is appreciative to the Canada Council for the Arts for awarding a Digital Originals grant, Queens Council on the Arts for two SU-CASA grants, PlySpace Residency Program for a Resident Artist Fellowship, Vermont Studio Center for an Artist Opportunity Fellowship, and to Highly Authorized for a fully funded residency. 

 

Skakun's red blood cells are mutated, spherically shaped and fragile; at age five she became severely anemic and underwent an emergency splenectomy, leaving her body immunocompromised.  For decades, as a way of survival as a chronically ill person, she has researched ways to boost immune systems in order to improve cell function and create healthy microbiomes.

 

The philosophy of her recent body of work began in 2014, when she was struck by a car while on her bike and left unable to walk for a year, resulting in permanent damage to her bones and muscles.  Informed by the process of being routinely sick and learning to walk again, her work references "organs" as a double-meaning of body parts and musical instrument, physical therapy equipment, prosthetics, and plants/foods which protect and heal our bodies.  She has explored sculptures as objects of ritual, labor, and play, ranging from time-based devotions to endurance trainings in order to transform mental and physical states of being.  The materials and rituals which help to regain and maintain a somewhat functioning body and immune system inform the materials and processes used in her sculptures.