Vesselina Nikolaeva

Vesselina Nikolaeva, Border-guard with a Dog, from No Man’s Land on the Edge of Europe, 2004 – 2005

Vesselina Nikolaeva is a Bulgarian-born documentary photographer, who graduated from the Art Academy in Utrecht, the Netherlands. She lives and works in Bulgaria and the Netherlands. Her work examines the socio-cultural relationships in contemporary Europe in the context of a diverse and struggling for unification continent. Her running projects, Coming of Age in an Adolescent Society and No man’s land: On the edge of Europe represent the metamorphosis of a historically marginalized society into a European nation-state partaking in the cultural transfer of globalization and modernization. Vesselina’s work in progress is internationally renowned, bringing her the Canon Award for 2004 in the Netherlands (for best young photographer under the 30s within the framework of “The Silver Camera 2004”), the Grand Prix of the 4th International Festival of Photography 2005 in Lodz, Poland and the Descubrimientos prize for best young photographer at “Photoespana 2005,” Madrid, Spain.