Veneta Androva (b. 1985, Sofia) is a visual artist and filmmaker based between Berlin and Sofia. Working across moving image, installation, and speculative documentary, she investigates how technological infrastructures, disinformation networks, and automated media shape perception, political imagination, and social reality.
Her projects combine documentary materials, archival traces, data, and computer-generated imagery to develop hybrid cinematic forms that make their underlying logics perceptible: the political economies of disinformation and automated propaganda, the entanglement of human labor and machine agency, and the mechanisms through which reality is produced, mediated, and governed.
Her latest film, Spray and Pray (2026), premiered in the International Short Film Competition at Visions du Réel, was presented as part of the Bulgarian Pavilion at the 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, and received an Honorary Mention at the Prix Ars Electronica. Her previous films include AIVA (2020), recipient of the Award of Distinction at the Prix Ars Electronica, and From My Desert (2019), nominated for the German Short Film Award.
Selected Awards
Willi Münzenberg Forum – Film Award, 2022
Golden Horseman for Animated Film (AIVA) – Filmfest Dresden, 2021
LUCA Gender Diversity Film Award (AIVA) – Filmfest Dresden, 2021
Prix Ars Electronica – Award of Distinction (AIVA), International Competition for CyberArts, 2021
Nominee – German Short Film Award (From My Desert), 2020
Critics’ Jury Award (From My Desert) – 25FPS International Experimental Film and Video Festival, 2020
Gaudenz B. Ruf Award for Contemporary Art, 2019
Solo / Duo exhibitions
The Secret Life of Mushrooms – Structura Gallery, Sofia, 2023
UNREST NOISES, Duo exhibition with Kang Eungbok, die PUTTE, Neu-Ulm, 2023
Becoming A Figure – Duo Exhibition with Peter Odinzow, Goethe-Institut Sofia, 2021
The Good Fight Is on the Gaming Floor – DISPLAY, Berlin, 2018
Selected Group Exhibitions
61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, Bulgarian Pavilion, Venice, 2026
DA Fest – International Digital Art Festival, Sofia, 2025
Screens and Schemes – Credo Bonum Gallery (Sofia) and Karpuchina Gallery (Prague), 2025
Passing Data – Upcycling the Digital, Prater Gallery, Berlin, 2024
I’M AFRAID I CAN DO THAT – TORULA Art Space, Győr, 2023
BEGEHUNGEN Art Festival – Palais Lichtenstein, 2023
Unexpected Care – Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), Sofia, 2023
Jürgen Wittdorf (1932–2018) – Schloss Biesdorf, Berlin, 2022
Facing B – Galeria Espacio Minimo, Madrid, 2021
CyberArts Exhibition – Ars Electronica Festival for Art, Technology & Society, 2021
Monitoring – Kassel Documentary Film and Video Festival, 2019
Selected Film Festivals
Visions du Réel – International Medium Length & Short Film Competition, 2026
Internationale Kurzfilmtage Winterthur, 2024
Courtisane Festival, Ghent, 2024
Go Short – International Short Film Festival Nijmegen, 2023
International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Film, 2022
PÖFF Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, 2021
25FPS International Experimental Film and Video Festival, 2021
Ars Electronica Animation Festival, 2021
FILMFEST DRESDEN International Short Film Festival, 2021
Short Film Festival Hamburg, 2021
Short Waves Festival, 2021
FILE Electronic Language International Festival, São Paulo, 2019
EMAF European Media Art Festival, 2019
Education
Master Class (Postgraduate Programme) with Prof. Else Gabriel – Weißensee Academy of Art Berlin, 2018–2019
Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design Jerusalem – with Miri Segal, Michal Helfman and Avi Mograbi, 2016–2017
Fine Arts (MFA/Diploma) – Weißensee Academy of Art Berlin, 2012–2018
History of Art and Philosophy (B.A.) – Humboldt University Berlin, 2009–2014
Selected Talks
Pedagogy of Hope – Radio GAMeC, collateral event of the 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, Venice, 2026
Strange New Species – LOOPS / New Practice in Art and Technology, University of the Arts and Technical University Berlin, 2026
Art Swaps – Artist talk, Prater Gallery, Berlin, 2024
What’s the Point of Artificial Intelligence? – Panel Discussion, Filmfest Dresden, 2024
Guest Lecture – Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema, Concordia University, Montreal, 2023
Animation Perspectives – DOK Leipzig, 2022
Artist Talk – Camera Austria, Graz, 2022
Guest Lecture – Burg Giebichenstein University of Art and Design Halle, 2021
Guest Lecture – Hamburg University of Applied Sciences, 2021
Prix Forum: The Re-Enchantment of Humanism – Panel Discussion, Ars Electronica, 2021
EthicAI=FORUM, Goethe-Institut Network, 2021
Deep Fakes – Lecture Performance, University Paderborn, 2021