ELINA AKSELRUD
elinaakselrud.com (photo by Alexander Wenzel/KUG)
The founder and artistic director of Intertwining Arts, as well as the lead artist of all its crossover projects is a Ukrainian-American pianist and fine art photographer Elina Akselrud. She made her orchestra debut at the age of eight, studying at Kyiv Special Music School with Irina Lipatova and Irina Barinova. Elina is a prize winner of international piano competitions, such as Chopin on Thousand Islands’10, USA (1st Prize), Chopin in Hartford’12, USA (1st Prize), Midwest’14 in IA, U.S.A (2nd Prize), Chopin in Canberra’14, Australia (3rd Prize) and others. The pianist has performed throughout Europe, Australia, and USA; she appeared with orchestras, such as the Ukrainian National Orchestra, the Kaufman Center Orchestra, NEC Symphony, and Lucerne Symphony, among others. Elina Akselrud received her education at Mannes School of Music in New York City, USA (Bachelor of Music’12), New England Conservatory in Boston, USA, with Alexander Korsantia (Master of Music’14), Hochschule Luzern – Musik in Lucerne, Switzerland, with Konstantin Lifschitz (Master of Arts in Music, Major Solo Performance’18), and Scuola di Musica di Fiesole in Florence, Italy, with Eliso Virsaladze. Elina is currently working on her Doctoral Degree in Artistic Research at the University of Music and Performing Arts Graz, Austria, where her project “Artistic Interpretation in a Crossdisciplinary Context - Late Piano Œuvre of Alexander Scriabin” has been supervised by Markus Schirmer and Deniz Peters, and where she holds a position of a research assistant.
Elina has been pursuing photography professionally since 2008. She studied the genre of Fine Art Photography with Anka Zhuravleva, as well as completed courses with Jennifer Thoreson, Sue Bryce, Lara Jade, and Brooke Shaden. Her works won awards at ViewBug.com (Staff Winter Selection 2015, Choice Award 2020), The New School University Alumni Summer Photo Contest (1st Prize, New York, NY, USA, 2015), The New School University Travel Photography Contest, (3rd Prize, New York, NY, USA, 2010). Hôtel Chopin Grands-Boulevards Paris (France) hosts a permanent exhibition of her still life works on a theme of Chopin since 2018. In 2020 Elina’s works were digitally featured in GuruShots groups exhibitions in Portugal, Sweden, Australia, and Canada; as well as at Colors of Humanity Art Gallery in USA, and printed works were exhibited during the 10x10x10 Tieton in WA, USA and Fine Art Exhibition at Blank Wall Gallery in Athens, Greece.