Nataliia Berezniak is a Ukrainian painter based in Munich since 2022. After more than a decade running her own graphic design studio in Odesa, the full-scale invasion pushed her back toward the practice she loved most — and toward a new visual language built from gold leaf, Bavarian landmarks, and hidden Ukrainian symbols.
Nataliia Berezniak was born in Pryluky and finished art school as a child, long before engineering studies and a graphic design certificate set her on a different professional path. For more than ten years she worked in graphic design — first as a designer in Odesa, then, from 2013, as the owner of her own studio with a team of five, building brand identities and advertising campaigns for companies across Ukraine and abroad.
Russia's full-scale invasion changed the course of her life. After relocating to Munich, Nataliia closed her design business, brought her German up to B2 level, and returned to what she had always loved most: painting. Today she works in oil and acrylic, combining European painting technique with Ukrainian cultural codes.
"Gold here isn't decoration — it's a way of saying that the memory of home is something valuable and indestructible, even when it's hidden deep."
Her central project, "Golden Threads of Memory: Bavaria Through Ukrainian Eyes," brings together two realities — the Bavarian one that surrounds her now, and the Ukrainian one she carries inside. Across ten works, Bavarian monuments, streets, and architectural details reveal, on closer look, hidden Ukrainian motifs: a reflection that turns a Bavarian monument into a Ukrainian one, angels and trident symbols folded into architectural detail. She applies gold leaf to give these hidden meanings light and a kind of sacredness.
Her path has already earned significant recognition. She gave her painting "Siegestor" ("Ворота Перемоги") as a gift to the Bavarian Parliament, where it now hangs. In autumn 2026, a solo exhibition of her work will open at the SPD office of Bavarian Parliament Vice President Markus Rinderspacher. Her practice has been covered by Münchner Merkur and Merkur.de, and her work has appeared in Arts to Hearts Magazine (issue 13). She is a member of the Ottobrunn artists' association and the Munich Artists' Association (Münchner Künstlerbund).
Over the past two years her work has appeared in group exhibitions in Munich ("Romantic Cities and Landscapes," December 2024; "30 Artists," December 2025), in Prague (February 2025), and at Schleißheimer Frühling in May 2026. Now she is looking to move beyond the gold-leaf series and explore a new artistic language — figurative conceptualism: a small human presence within a large format, deliberate incompleteness, imperfection, contrast of scale, and a quiet but emotionally powerful relationship with the canvas's space. Staying figurative matters to her — it's what keeps her language distinct from pure abstraction.
Alongside her own practice, Nataliia teaches painting at Kunstatelier ArtTime in Neubiberg and runs her own workshops. She also organizes group exhibitions for Ukrainian artists in Munich — work she considers no less important than her own art, since it gives voice to other Ukrainian authors working in Germany.
More of her work can be found at berezniak.art and on Instagram @berezniak.art.