Yulia Fintiktikova is from Mariupol, Ukraine. Fintiktikova’s poetic manner gives an impression of unmediated sincerity and childlike artlessness. Yet it also forms a complicated web of literary allusions and intonational echoes, referring the reader to the key moments in 20th century Russian poetry; most prominently, futurism (as exemplified by Velimir Khlebnikov and Elena Guro), absurdism (Daniil Kharms), and conceptualism (Dmitri Prigov); to the experimental musical performance genre popularized by Petr Mamonov (Zvuki Mu), Psoy Korolenko, and Pahom; and to Soviet children’s poetry and nursery rhymes.

In Russian, Fintiktikova’s spelling is deliberately flawed and phonocentric, her usage ranging from agrammatical to hyper-official. Her lyrics are often slightly off, as if spoken by a foreigner, forced to rely on textbook phrases and stock expressions.

Fintiktikova is also a performance artist. She regularly takes part in experimental music projects. Most of her texts have been written as performance pieces.

Oksana Maksymchuk is a bilingual Ukrainian-American poet, scholar, and literary translator. Her debut English-language poetry collection Still City is the 2024 Pitt Poetry Series selection, published by University of Pittsburgh Press (US) and Carcanet Press (UK). In the Ukrainian, she is the author of poetry collections Xenia and Lovy and a recipient of Antonych and Smoloskyp prizes, two of Ukraine’s top awards for younger poets. 

Max Rosochinsky is a scholar, translator, and poet from Simferopol, Crimea. He co-edited Words for War: New Poems from Ukraine, a groundbreaking anthology of contemporary poetry; and co-translated Lyuba Yakimchuk’s Apricots of Donbas and Marianna Kiyanovska’s The Voices of Babyn Yar, winner of 2023 Translation Prize from American Association for Ukrainian Studies.