Yelena Yemchuk

Who is Yelena Yemchuk?

Yelena Yemchuk is a professional photographer, painter and film director, best known for her work with The Smashing Pumpkins. Born in Kiev, Ukraine, her family moved to Brooklyn, New York when Yelena was in her early teens.

Yemchuk directed or co-directed the videos for "Zero" and "Thirty-Three". In addition, she handled art direction for the Adore album and its related singles. Her photographs appear in the "Zero" EP, the The Aeroplane Flies High box set, and the Rotten Apples compilation. She received an art direction credit for the 2000 Smashing Pumpkins album Machina/The Machines of God, and appeared in the video for the song "Stand Inside Your Love". She also provided the photography for albums by Savage Garden and Rufus Wainwright. Her fashion photography is featured in the September 2010 Urban Outfitters catalog.

She has exhibited her paintings at the Dactyl Foundation. Her paintings "displays her uniquely surrealist approach to art with satiric storytelling and undeniable Eastern European influences".

Her current focus on fashion photography began in 2001. Since then, Yemchuk has contributed to Italian and Japanese Vogue, the New Yorker and W, and has shot advertising campaigns for Kenzo, Cacharel and Dries Van Noten.