The composer Marina Khorkova lives and works in Russia and Germany. From 2000 to 2005 she studied composition at the Moscow Conservatory. In 2008 she received a grant by Paul Sacher Stiftung in /Switzerland followed by grant of the DAAD, which allowed her to follow up on her studies of composition by Prof. Caspar Johannes Walter at the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst Stuttgart, Germany. She was also granted residency fellowships by Villa Aurora (Los Angeles, CA/USA), Schloss Soltide (Stuttgart/Germany), Künstlerhof Schreyhan (Wustrow/Germany), Villa Sträuli (Winterthur/Schweiz), Künstlerhaus Otte (Eckernförde/Germany).

She received numerous awards and distinctions, from organizations including the Oskar and Vera Ritter Foundation, the Lieselotte Klein Foundation Berlin and the Kunststiftung Baden-Württemberg. In 2011 she was awarded the DAAD Prize for Outstanding Artistic Achievement. In 2011 she was granted the Ernst-Krenek-Preis at impuls festival in /Austria that was joined to a residency as composer-in-residence in Austria. Her work ALEPH premiered performed by Ensemble Klangforum Wien in the context of the festival steirischer herbst 2012 in Graz. 2013 she was awarded the Kompositionspreis of Staubach Honoria and a grant by the Internationalen Ferienkurse Darmstadt in 2014 on which her work klangNarbe was performed by Enseble Accanto for the first time. 2017 she was granted the Berlin-Rheinsberger Kompositionspreis. Her work «dissonance of time» (with the support of the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation) was premiered in the course of the festival Bludenzertage zeitgemäßer Musik, Austria performed by Ensemble soundinitiative/ in 2015. The production of her chamber opera «et cetera» (ARCHIPEL GULAG) was premiered in June 2016.

Her works have been broadcasted multiple times, such as by Deutschlandfunk, WDR 3, ORF, SRF and Radio Swiss Classic. In 2013 she was selected by the CD label for a series of CD's of the Deutsche Musikrat. The CD is published in coproduction by Deutschlandfunk in 2016.

In the course of various festivals Marina Khorkova participated in master classes of Brian Ferneyhough, Georges Aperghis, Mark Andre, , Brice Pauset, Toshio Hosokawa, , , Peter Ablinger, Martijn Padding, Roland Moser and Frédéric Durieux.

Khorkova’s works have been performed worldwide by such as New York Philharmonic, Ensemble Klangforum Wien, (Freiburg), SWR Vocalensemble (Stuttgart), the Thürmchen Ensemble and Ensemble Handwerk (Cologne), Ensemble Ascolta (Stuttgart), Ensemble LUX:NM and Kairos Quartet (Berlin), Ensemble Reflexion K (Eckernförde), the soundinitiative (Paris), the Proton Ensemble (Bern), the Camerata Variabile (Basel), Ensemble TaG (Winterthur), the Lyris Quartet (Los Angeles), the Vinca Quartet (USA), Ensemble Nostri Temporis (Kiev), the Studio for New Music, the Mark Pekarsky Percussion Ensemble, the State Academic Symphony Orchestra of the Russian Federation and the Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra (Moscow).

Her works have been premiered at numerous festivals: the Festival CONTACT! Co-Presentation of the New York Philharmonic and National Sawdust, the ECLAT in Stuttgart 2019, the MicroFest in Los Angeles 2015, the Sommer in Stuttgart 2015, the remusic festival S-Petersburg 2015, the Ars Amatoria – Liebeskunst in Zürich-Basel 2015, the musikprotokoll series at the Steirischer Herbst Festival 2012, the Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik 2012, the Unerhörte Musik im BKA 2012 and 2015 (Berlin), the tonArt-Festival (Esslingen), at the International Conference “Micronality. Praxis & Utopia” (Stuttgart), The New Music Triduum (Krakow), IN-BETWEEN Berlin < > St. Petersburg, the Multimediales Festival “Sinfonie der Bilder” (Stuttgart), a double portrait concert as part of the “frau musica (nova)” series presented by Deutschlandfunk (Cologne), the project “Musikalische Lyrik – Das Lied als Experiment” in cooperation with the Neuen Vokalsolisten Stuttgart and the “Moscow Autumn” festival of new music.