Ruslana

Ruslana Stepanivna Lyzhychko (born on 24 May 1973) is a World Music Award winning and MTV Europe Music Award nominated artist, and the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2004.

She is a singer, songwriter, producer, conductor, and pianist. She writes, composes and produces her own songs and music videos. Since 28 December 1995 she has been married to Oleksandr Ksenofontov, a Ukrainian record producer. Together they have run the company Luxen Studio since 1993, producing radio and film trailers.
She won the Eurovision Song Contest 2004 with the song "Wild Dances" receiving points from 34 of the 35 countries participating in the contest.

As of 2009, despite the fact that she was invited as a Special Guest Star, she nevertheless was awarded two special trophies at the 6th Asia Song Festival. The first of them was the golden statue of The Best Artist Award of The Asia Song Festival 2009, the main award of the festival and the second special award for the contribution to the cultural exchange between Ukraine and Asia in music.

In autumn 2004 Ruslana actively supported the democratic processes in Ukraine known as the Orange Revolution, to which her song "Dance with the Wolves" was devoted. She declared her support for Viktor Yushchenko during the disputed Ukrainian presidential elections. She became one of the prominent figures that addressed the mass crowds rallying in support of Yushchenko's demand that his original defeat be declared fraudulent. From spring 2006 to summer 2007 she was a Member of the Ukrainian Parliament for the party Our Ukraine.

Due to political reasons the music video supporting her second single extracted from the Wild Dances album, Dance with the Wolves was censored in Russia as it contains fragments showing Ruslana in the Independence Square.

Ruslana endorsed Yulia Tymoshenko during the 2010 Ukrainian presidential election and actively supported her candidature during the election campaign.

Ruslana was appointed Good Will Ambassador of Ukraine by the UNICEF and combats trafficking in human beings. She released two video clips which aim to make potential victims aware of the dangers of human trafficking. In February 2008 Ruslana performed at an anti-human trafficking event in Vienna, Austria, organized by UN.GIFT (The United Nations Global Initiative to Fight Human Trafficking) in front of 117 international delegations. Her song "Not for Sale" became the anthem of the anti-trafficking campaign.

Ruslana's new project Wild Energy is based on the science fiction novel by Maryna and Sergij Diachenko Wild Energy. Lana. In a future city which experiences a global energy crisis, far more threatening than lack of oil and gas, people are lacking their will for life, their energy of the heart - the fuel for people. Lana, one of the synthetic inhabitants, sets out to find the mystical energy source. After many adventures she discovers that the wild energy comes from her own heart. Wild Energy combines the art of music and video production, literature and social commitment in an extraordinary way. In June 2006 Ruslana presented the new single and video "Wild Energy" in a unique fantasy style. In this video clip the singer develops from a synthetic blonde girl into her wild image

With her project Wild Energy Ruslana supports the use of renewable energy. She regards the energy of the sun, the water and the wind as an energy independence. The project gradually developed into this bigger meaning. Ruslana wants to make people aware of the dangers of global climate change.