Vitaliy Pukhanov was born in 1966 in Kiev. He is the author of five books of poetry, including The Wooden Garden (Moscow, 1995), The School of Mercy (Moscow, 2014), and To Alyosha (St. Petersburg, 2020). From 2003-2016, he was in charge of the literary prize Debut. Since 2019, he has been in charge of the Poetry Prize. Winner of the Novyi Mir prize (2011), Anthologia prize (2014), etc.