MARUSYA KAZAKOVA aka BABAЯGA [BABAJAHGA] is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice spans contemporary art, fashion, performance, and ritual, incorporating intuitive and healing modalities as integral components of her work.

    Born in the Soviet Union and carrying Slavic–Siberian roots, her work is deeply informed by ancestral memory, cultural symbolism, and spiritual inquiry. Raised in post-Soviet Siberia and later moving through Moscow, London, and New York, her trajectory reflects a layered cultural geography that continues to shape the foundation of her artistic language.

    Her earlier project, JAHNKOY, established her as an internationally recognized voice through a body of work centered on global cultural restoration, racial equity, and the reactivation of traditional craft within contemporary practice. Moving fluidly between fashion, installation, and performance, the project explored identity, displacement, and collective memory, positioning the garment as both artifact and narrative.

   The work gained international visibility through exhibitions and collaborations, and JAHNKOY was recognized by institutions including the LVMH Prize (2017) and Forbes 30 Under 30 in Art & Style (2018). Kazakova received ongoing support from the CFDA (2017–2019), and led a long-term collaboration with PUMA (2017–2021). She was also recognized by Esquire’s “12 Apostles” in the Art category (2021).

    Following a profound personal and spiritual transformation, Kazakova entered a new phase of her practice under the name BABAЯGA [BABAJAHGA]. This shift marked a return to the sacred as both methodology and purpose, rooted in reindigenization and the reclamation of ancestral knowledge as a living, evolving force.

    Her current body of work expands beyond object-making into ritual, performance, and experiential practices. She creates immersive works that function as carriers of memory, transformation, and transmission, including acrylic paintings incorporating textile and collage, one-of-a-kind garments, sacred objects, and performative works. Bridging street and vernacular expressions with sacred languages, her practice proposes art as a site of activation—where material, gesture, and presence converge to reconfigure relationships between body, identity, and collective consciousness.

Alongside her artistic practice, Kazakova engages in intuitive and healing work, offering ceremonial experiences, rituals, and one-on-one sessions that support processes of transformation, reconnection, and remembrance. Her work continues to evolve through site-specific installations, ceremonial practices, and performative works that invite audiences into states of presence, participation, and collective awakening.