Slavik Fokin aka Oxwel was born in 1984 in Odessa, Ukraine. After leading a nomadic life with stints in Italy, France, and the United States, he now resides in Ukraine.

Slavik used to be a performance artist. Highlights of his experience include taking part in Marina Abramovic’s show and working as a performer at the Venice Biennale. Following the Marina Abramovic Method, in his performances, Slavik attempted to explore the state of being present in both time and space and to snapshot the moment of nowness in all its complexity and diversity.

When the Covid pandemic happened, performance as a genre was put on hold. It was not possible to do performances in isolation, as a viewer is an essential component of it. For this reason, Slavik couldn’t perform for two years. After such a break, it was like starting from scratch.

Painting became a new beginning for him. He had an inner protest against visual apprehensibility. No recognizable objects on canvases, minimalistic abstract expressionism.

In 2021, he minted his first NFTs. Not a single NFT from that initial mint was bought though, so he burned them all later. In 2022, Oxwel discovered post-GAN AI tools, and they became a new source of inspiration for him. Currently, he experiments with AI art using both image and text generators in his practice.