| Irena Karpa | |
| Birth Date: | 8 December 1980 |
| Birth Place: | Cherkasy, Ukraine |
| Language: | Ukrainian |
| Alma Mater: | Kyiv National Linguistic University |
| Period: | since 1999 |
| Awards: | "Hranoslov" (1999) "Best Ukrainian Awards" (2006) |
Irena Karpa (Ukrainian: Ірена Карпа; born 8 December 1980 in Cherkasy) is a Ukrainian writer, journalist, and singer.
Born in Cherkasy (Central Ukraine), Karpa grew up in Subcarpathian region (Prykarpattia).
Since 1999 she has been the frontwoman and songwriter of the band Faktychno Sami (later renamed "Qarpa"). Her first book was published in 2000 when she was a student at Kyiv National Linguistic University. In 2003 Karpa received a graduate's degree (magistar) in the English and French languages. After graduating she traveled Southeast Asia for a year. This sparkled the appearance of her book "Freud Would Cry".
From 2005 to 2008, she worked on TV (ICTV, Inter and MTV Ukraine). In 2004 she was a film director of "Kyiv. Limited Edition" and later in 2006 starred in Oleh Anpilohov's film "Autism" and A. Yakushenkov's film "Compote".
On May 17, 2008, Irena married journalist and writer Anton Friedland, but in 2009 they divorced. In September she married an American financier Norman Paul Hansen. They have two daughters.
Irena uses some strong words in her books. Some of her works have been translated into Polish, Czech, Bulgarian and Russian.
On 13 October 2014, according to Euromaidan, the minister of culture of the self-proclaimed "republic of Donetsk" signed a death warrant ordering that she be shot for publishing a cartoon considered inappropriate.
See Qarpa