Anna Sarvira

Illustrator · Curator · Art Director

Cologne/Kyiv

Hi! I'm Anna!

I'm a freelance illustrator based in Cologne (Germany), originally from Kyiv (Ukraine).

I enjoy working on different kinds of illustration, from book and editorial to comics and wall paintings. I like that I can talk in my illustrations about difficult topics, but also be funny and bold.

Together with Oleg Gryshchenko and Olena Staranchuk, I founded the Pictoric Illustrators Club in 2014 - an independent cultural organization from Ukraine that organizes illustration and graphics exhibitions in Ukraine and abroad.

Books (selected)

• The playground we love and loved (Hopology, Taipei, 2025)
• The girl who kept her eyes open (European Commission, 2023)
• Illustration in Ukraine (CP Publishing, Kyiv, 2021)
• Brave Bunnies book series was published in 2021 by Ladybird Publishing and DeA Publishing in several countries, including Great Britain, Australia, Italy, and Ukraine.
• Zero waste (Vivat, Kyiv, 2020)
• Tiny Stories (Osnovy, Kyiv, 2018)
• No adults! (Luta Sprava, Kyiv, 2017)
• Girls Power (Knygolove, Kyiv, 2017) 

Awards and Scholarships (selected)

• Scholarship MGZsheroes , Mediengründerzentrum NRW 2024
• Bologna Children's Book Fair "Landscapes and Portraits winner" 2023
• Scholarship of the Adobe Creative Residency Fund 2022
• Joseph Binder Award in Gold in Media Illustration Category 2022 
• Recherchestipendium der Stadt Köln 2022
• Stipendium INITIAL 2 Akademie der Künste 2022
• Stipendium des Ministeriums für Kultur und Wissenschaft NRW 2022
• Awarded by Bologna Children's Book Fair in 2017 and 2019
• Participant of Nami Concourse Exhibition, South Korea in 2018
• Resident at Prague Civil Society Center in Chisinau and Prague in 2018
• Resident at Internationales Bilderbuchfestival (Germany) in 2017
  
• Resident at Raizvanguarda (Gois, Portugal) in 2016
• Resident at Gaude Polonia in 2013 

Worked with

UNICEF, Museum of Modern Art New York, Goethe Institute, British Council, UN Women, Coca-Cola, Chobani, the European Commission, Penguin Books, Blue Rabbit Publishing, RADAR OST Festival at Deutsches Theater Berlin, Benchmark Education, Glowberry Books, Lyuta Sprava, Osnovy publishing, Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum, and many more

Works featured in

CBS News, Bloomberg (USA), The Economist (UK), arte.tv, Deutschlandfunk, ZEITmagazin, BR, Weltkunst, RTL aktuell, Tagesspiegel (all Germany), Svergies Radio (Sweden), SRF, Republik, Neue Züricher Zeitung (all Switzerland), Volkskrant (Netherlands), Forbes (Czech Republic) and many more

Art Director of Brave Bunnies TV series

Anna developed the styles for the internationally broadcasted TV series Brave Bunnies. It is a drawn and animated TV series developed in Ukraine and today broadcasted all around the globe, among other countries in Germany (Toggolino, Super RTL), United Kingdom (BBC), Italy (RAI), Norway, Australia, South Korea, Ukraine, LATAM countries and Spain.

Speaker at:

Pictoplasma Conference 2022 (Berlin), Bologna Children's Book Fair 2023 (Bologna), NEED Conference 2023 (Warsaw), Frankfurt Book Fair 2023 (Frankfurt), LUSTR Festival 2024 (Prague), Melba Conference 2024 (Sofia), Baba Jaga Festival 2024 (Rome)

Exhibitions (selected)

2026

• Pictoric & Mystetskyi Arsenal exhibition project about the history of Ukrainian illustration (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Pictoric's group exhibition (Chaumont, France)
• ...

2024

• Pictoric's group exhibition "When Everything Matters" at the Bologna Children's Book Fair (Bologna, Italy)
• Ukrainian House (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Limassol Old Port Square (Limassol, Cyprus)
• Centro Cultural Casa de Francia (Mexico City, Mexico)
• Bildungsverein Soziales Lernen und Kommunikation (Hannover, Germany)
• Koppelkerk Art Centre (Bredevoort, Netherlands)
• Verteilerhaus (Berlin, Germany)
• personal exhibition at Rasom Space (Harlem, Netherlands)

2022

• K20 (Düsseldorf, Germany)
• Bilderbuchmuseum (Troisdorf, Germany)
• MOM art space (Hamburg, Germany)
• Pictoplasma (Berlin, Germany)
• Frankfurt Book Fair (Frankfurt, Germany)
• Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya (Barcelona, Spain)
• Rabryka (Görlitz, Germany)
• Ukrainian Museum (New York City, USA)
• Bilder Gegen den Krieg at Comic Salon (Erlangen, Germany)
• Visions from Ukraine (Ottawa, Canada)
• Space M gallery (Tokyo, Japan)
• Galleria delle Carrozze (Florence, Italy)
• Helsinki Central Library Oodi (Helsinki, Finland)
• Frauenmuseum (Bonn, Germany)
• Münchner Stadtbibliothek (München, Germany)
• Kunstverein Göppingen (Göppingen, Germany)
• Bücherfest Köln at Horbach Stiftung (Köln, Germany)
• Buchmesse Saarbrücken (Saarbrücken, Germany),
• Ebertplatz (exhibition in public, Köln, Germany)

2020

• the Library of Children's Literature Seoul (Seoul, South Korea)
• Silpo Art Space (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Orthodox Gallery (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• personal exhibition at Silpo Art Space (Kyiv, Ukraine)

2017

• Itabashi Art Museum (Tokyo, Japan)
• Nishinomiya, Otani Memorial Art Museum (Japan)
• Takahama, Kawara Art Museum (Japan)
• Ishikawa, Nanao Art Museum (Japan)
• the Columbia College (Chicago, USA)
• the DOKK1 Library at the Aarhus Hay Festival (Denmark)
• the International Children's Content Rights Fair  (Chiang Mai, Thailand)
• Bologna Children’s Book Fair (Bologna, Italy)
• Book Arsenal International exhibition (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Tbilisi Book Fair (Tbilisi, Georgia) 
• personal exhibition at the French Institute (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• personal exhibition at Barbakan Bar and Art Space (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• personal exhibition at TSUM (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• personal exhibition at Orthodox Gallery (Kyiv, Ukraine)

2025

• Pictoric's group exhibition "Ukraine: Yesterday and Today" at the Bologna Children's Book Fair (Bologna, Italy)
  
• Pictoric's group exhibition "Everything is translation" at Book Arsenal (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Pictoric's group exhibition "Safe Place" at the Latvian National Library (Riga, Latvia)
• Pictoric's group exhibition "Life on the edge" at the Leipzig Book Fair (Leipzig, Germany)
• personal exhibition at Maison Temps-Reves (Taipei, Taiwan)
  
• personal exhibition at art/science Festival (Bielefeld, Germany)
  
• Lew-Kopolew-Forum (Cologne, Germany)
• Illustration Ladies Festival (Cologne, Germany)
• Illu Festival (Cologne, Germany)
  

2023

• group exhibition at the Bologna Children's Book Fair (Bologna, Italy)
• Kolumba Museum (Cologne, Germany)
• Opening of the Itabashi Art Museum (Tokyo, Japan)
• Otani Memorial Art Museum Nishinomiya (Hyogo, Japan) 
• Nanao Art Museum (Ishikawa, Japan)
• Institut Français Indonesia (Jakarta, Indonesia)
• Ukrainian Institute in Germany (Berlin, Germany)
• "War on Distance" in Berliner Festspiele (Berlin, Germany)
• Pohoda Festival (Trencin, Slovakia) 
• Dartmouth College Library (Hanover, USA)
• Ukrainian Museum of Canada (Ontario Branch, Canada)
• Book Arsenal (Kyiv, Ukraine), LITEXPO (Vilnius, Lithuania)
• Historical Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Sarajevo, Bosnia, and Herzegovina)
• Ukrainian Cultural Center Stockholm (Stockholm, Sweden)
• Volkshochschule (Neuss, Krefeld, Schwerte, all Germany)
• ASG Bildungsforum (Düsseldorf, Germany)
• Orangerie des Neuen Schlosses (Bayreuth, Germany)
• Bildungsforum (Leverkusen, Germany) 
• Stadttheater Ingolstadt (Ingolstadt, Germany)

2021

• Eyes on Ukraine (Torino, Italy)
• Silpo Art Space (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Orthodox Gallery (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Book Arsenal International exhibition (Kyiv, Ukraine)

2019

• Yealife Art Space (Shenzhen, China)
• Ishikawa Nanao Art Museum (Ishikawa, Japan)
• Bologna Children’s Book Fair (Bologna, Italy)
• Book Arsenal International exhibition (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Orthodox Gallery (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Nami Concourse Exhibition (Seoul, South Korea)
• Taichung University of Taiwan (Taiwan)

2018

• Duo Yun Xuan Art Museum (Shanghai, China)
• Today Museo (Beijing, China)
• Sky Art Gallery (TSUM, Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Book Arsenal International exhibition (Kyiv, Ukraine)
• Orthodox Gallery (Kyiv, Ukraine)

Contact

Email: anna.sarvira@gmail.com

©Anna Sarvira 2024