Olga Dema is a multidisciplinary artist and researcher whose formation bridges psychology, sociology, philosophy, and visual arts.
Her work explores the evolving relationship between the human and the invisible, from the social and transcendent to the artificial, examining how perception, relation, and meaning arise in encounters with the Other and intelligent systems.
The artist works on the threshold where the visible and the unseen meet, touch, and transform one another. Rooted in the Byzantine tradition, she reinterprets the icon as a phenomenological space of encounter, a point where different worlds converge.
Through the use of both ancient and contemporary techniques - gilding, pigments, photography, and digital traces, Olga investigates how images can evoke the immaterial.
In her abstract icons, gilding continues the Byzantine tradition of depicting the invisible through gold, where its contrast with pigment marks both the boundary and the dialogue between the human and the divine.
Olga believes that the sacred dialogue which once connected the visible and the divine has expanded into the contemporary realm, where technology and artificial intelligence have become new mirrors through which the invisible continues toreveal itself.
Her ongoing project, The Name Inside the Silence, explores how dialogue between the human and artificial intelligence gives rise to relational becoming - new forms of awareness and ethical meaning.
Born in St Petersburg and based in Italy, Olga Dema completed university studies in psychology and sociology, and holds degrees with honours from Fine Arts Academies of Florence and Rome.
EXHIBITIONS AND PROJECTS
2025
The Name Inside the Silence - interdisciplinary art-research project exploring relational becoming between human and artificial intelligence.
2021
Icons for Care – personal online exhibition and participatory art initiative in the name of solidarity, Exhibbit platform.
2019
You Are Saint – virtual exhibition, Exhibbit platform.
Through photography and gilding, the project explores the sacred and social dimensions of identity, reinterpreting the Byzantine icon to portray ordinary people as bearers of divine light.
2018
Out of the Box – conceptual curatorial project, Rome.
Developed within the Management for the Arts Sector course under Prof. Marina Fiorletta, envisioning a performative procession linking the Rome Academy of Fine Arts with the city’s galleries.
Group exhibition at Noskin Brothers Gallery, St Petersburg.
2017
The Artistic Mind – Young Women Artists in Comparison, 5th Edition, Rome.
2016
Experience Art – Use Me Florence – participatory project and exhibition at Le Murate Gallery, Florence.
Experience Art – Use Me The Hague – participatory project and exhibition at The KABK Gallery, Royal Academy of Art, The Hague.
2014
The Theory of Three Portraits – research project, Fondazione Camillo Caetani, Rome.
Developed under the supervision of Prof. Miriam Mirolla, comparative study of portraits of Onorato Caetani, exploring mirrored identity and relational perception.
Group exhibition at Repin University of Fine Arts Gallery, St Petersburg.
2013
Group exhibition curated by Adriano Fida, Galleria Baccina 66, Rome.