On June 26, 2025, the Alice Salomon Poetics Prize 2025 was awarded to the Ukrainian artist and writer Yevgenia Belorusets.
To kick off the award ceremony, Prof. Dr. Bettina Völter, President of ASH Berlin, welcomed the invited guests in the Audimax, which was well attended despite the summer heat. Guido Rademacher then read out the jury's statement. He is a lecturer in the Biographical and Creative Writing Master's program and a member of the Alice Salomon Poetry Prize jury. Yevgenia Belorusets impressed the jury with her "wide artistic range and interdisciplinarity". In her texts and photographs, she "takes the reader and viewer along with her with empathy and directness like a camerawoman" and "simultaneously unfolds the surreal and metaphorical potential of the situations". According to the jury, her works are politically committed and make an important contribution to social action in society. The jury was particularly impressed by the "poetic, touching and at the same time vivid depiction of everyday life" with which Belorusets addresses "social grievances and, among other things, more recently the effects of the war on the civilian population in Ukraine".
Yevgenia Belorusets was born in Ukraine and lives in Berlin and Kiev. She works with photography and other art forms at the interface of art, literature and activism. With her photographic work, she collects stories from everyday life and draws attention to the most vulnerable in Ukrainian society, be it queer families, unemployed miners, Roma or residents of the areas in the east of the country that have long been affected by the war. Her documentation of the consequences of the Russian invasion of Ukraine since February 24, 2022 attracted particular attention in Germany.
Before ASH President Bettina Völter presented the prize to the writer Yevgenia Belorusets, Prof. Dr. Susanne Frank gave her a laudatory speech. Frank is head of the Department of East Slavic Literatures and Cultures at Humboldt University in Berlin.
Yevgenia Belorusets felt very honored to be awarded the Alice Salomon Poetics Prize: "It is a great honor and pleasure for me! The prize speaks of the autonomy and self-determination of art, also in its endeavors to do social work, to serve human rights, to work scientifically. Art dreams of its own usefulness and does not allow itself to remain useful. The figure of Alice Salomon reminds us all how much bravery it takes to think humanely and posthumanely in dark times."
With the Alice Salomon Poetics Prize, ASH Berlin honors artists who contribute to the further development of literary, visual and acoustic arts through their special formal language and diversity, always working and acting in an interdisciplinary manner. The award comes with prize money of 6,000 euros. In addition, the artists are given the opportunity to present their literary approach in a lecture and to design the south façade of the university.
The event was musically framed by the artist Anatoly Belov. Like Belorusets, Belov also comes from Ukraine and works at the interface of music, visual art and performance. In his art, he combines queer perspectives with socio-political themes - directly, poetically and often with a clear stance against authoritarianism and exclusion.
After the award ceremony, the university invited guests to a summer party in the courtyard.
Selected photos from the award ceremony can be found in the picture gallery above.
