Biography
Veronika Kvitko, known as Vegesent, is a multidisciplinary artist based in Finland. She aims to initiate conversations and spark awareness around production animals and sustainability through her art.
She was born in Sarapul, Russia, in 1990 and currently resides and works in Helsinki, Finland. Being raised on an animal farm in a small town near the Ural Mountains, the scarcity around her in childhood became abundance, as it taught her to cherish life beyond material things and forge deep connections with the earth, empathy for animals, and inner resilience.
The foundation for her creative path was laid by an eight-year full-time scholarship at the Aesthetic School of Visual and Performing Arts in Sarapul.
With 20 years of experience as a creative professional, she began actively working in digital media, contemporary illustration, and photography at the age of 17. In 2016, during the course of her professional career, she earned a BA in Graphic Design from Metropolia UAS in Finland.
As her awareness of environmental issues deepened, she shifted her focus toward individual choices and creative practice as a way to address broader industry-wide problems.
Eventually, drawing on her early artistic training, she transitioned to experimenting with mixed media paintings, blending her diverse skills and experiences.
Raising awareness about environmental issues and the lives of farmed animals, her art has received the A’ Design Award and the Vegan Choice Award. She currently serves as Head of Sustainable Development and Art Education at the Helsinki International Artists Association.
Her work has been shown at Helsinki’s Cable Factory and the Helsinki City Museum, and featured in international publications, including “100 Artists of Europe.” Her pieces are held in private collections across the UK and Europe.
Artist statement
My artistic practice explores the relationship between humans, animals, and systems of environmental exploitation through conceptual and material-based approaches. Working under the name Vegesent, I create multidisciplinary works using sustainable, repurposed, and biodegradable materials to question normalized systems of ecological harm and violence toward non-human life.
My work operates at the intersection of minimalism, tactile abstraction, and conceptual art. Through dense, relief-like surfaces, I investigate materiality, texture, and the emotional weight carried by objects and organic matter.
All of my works are grounded in research-based facts related to animal agriculture, biodiversity loss, climate change, sustainability, and the politics of consumption. I use restrained colour palettes and simplified compositions to direct attention toward texture, depth, material presence, and emotional atmosphere.
The visibility of production animals and the ethical realities of their existence are central to my practice. Through abstraction, texture, and material transformation, I investigate how systems of consumption normalize separation from non-human life, distancing society from both ecological consequences and animal suffering. Rather than using direct representation, I approach these themes through tactile surfaces, reduced forms, and conceptual material language that invite slower emotional and sensory engagement.
Material research is central to my process. I begin through experimentation with reclaimed and discarded materials, allowing their histories, textures, and physical properties to shape the conceptual direction of the work. Through reduction and careful refinement, I remove unnecessary elements until the material itself carries the emotional and conceptual weight of the piece. Through this practice, I approach art as a form of advocacy, ecological reflection, and renewed relation between humans and non-human life.