PROFESIONAL EXPERIENCE:
Maria Valkova is a graphic designer and a freelance teacher. She began her professional education at the Аrt high school in Plovdiv and continued at the National Academy of Arts in Sofia, where she earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Book and print graphics. She specialized for one semester each in Germany and South Korea, where she focused more on typography, calligraphy and illustration. She continues to attend online and face-to-face courses on various topics in the field. She is interested in the development of contemporary art in its visual, sound and performative forms.
For the last 4 years, she has been delving into presentation design and improving her presentation skills as part of the 356labs agency. On their behalf, she worked for clients from the business world, such as Deloitte, Paysafe, Modis, Westernacher, Konstruktive, etc. She is currently engaged in graphic design for the cultural sector and various educational initiatives. It is part of the design and art space Avrtikl, as well as the education platform znam.be. She works with the National Art Gallery, the National Museum of Natural History (NPM-BAS), the Goethe Institute, the museum mediation program “Viewing with Understanding” and others.
ACHIEVEMENTS:
At ARC Academy, she started as a lecturer on Perspective, Life drawing and Composition at the Summer Academy of Illustration 2022. Her teaching experience includes leading Illustration and Drawing (on a model) at the Iliya Petrov National Art High School. She has been invited as a guest lecturer on presentation skills to the participants of TEDxAUBG, to scientists from NPM-BAS, to students from NHA, to various professionals from the business world, etc. She created and led a variety of creativity activities for children. In all of them, she approaches in a non-standard way to stimulate deep understanding of the material, experimentation and fun.
On the Bulgarian market, you can find the book with her illustrations, “Colored Rug”, by the classic Yordan Radichkov, ed. Nike, 2017.