Fifteen paintings to bring summer back to you

Lightness, mosaic structure and optimistic colors of last summer’s best experiences serve as the leitmotif of Katsuba’s latest exhibition. “It is too early to prepare for the New Year celebrations,” the artist smiled while meeting visitors to the event. “We are still fondly recalling the summer memories. Some of its elements, fragments of its heat, light, sound, and emotion are still on everyone’s mind.”

Her desire to relive, over and over again, now by the means of art, the memorable moments of that most pleasant season when the humans and nature merge in peace, resulted in highly expressive paintings.

The event’s reassuring mood once again shows Katsuba as an artist who seeks beautiful ways to decorate life and succeeds in her quest. “The artist lives through their eyes. I catch myself out sometimes seeing everything in shades when going out, imagining how I would paint it on the canvas. When unable to do so immediately, I store the idea in my visual memory and always come back to it later,” the artist told us.

The Triptych Gallery’s staff said their new project, while unusual for a gallery, was very warm and nice. “We usually work with so-called professional artists who earn their living by painting. People who paint and create art just because their hearts need it are called amateurs. Their works are honest, bright, open,” the gallery’s founder Yurii Komelkov said at the opening ceremony.

I caught myself thinking that these 15 works, done in an interesting mosaic technique, made up a mosaic of my summer themselves. Sand, deep water, poignantly blue sky, sunset over the ocean, a heat wave in the city, flowers and fruit – everything looked alive and very real. Berries in glass vases were filled with light, bright and juicy, as well as tasty and genuine, like Katsuba’s paintings.

COMMENTARIES

Olena CHUIKOVA, art critic, art director of the Euro-Art Auction House:

“I see this artist as highly promising. The works are beautiful and signify the beginning of a long journey.”

Oleh PINCHUK, sculptor:

“Katsuba is extraordinary. Quite a few artists would benefit from learning her ways of choosing correct colors, loving life, and bringing joy through art.”

The Day’s FACT FILE

Yana Katsuba was born in Prague. She graduated from the Design and Interior Decoration School at Kharkiv State Academy of Design and Hanna Dakhno’s Teaching Studio of Painting. Since 2005, she has been working in her own studio. Her first exhibition, called “The Total Perception,” was held in Kyiv last year.

The exhibition will run until October 16. Admission to summer is free! Gallery address: 34 Andriivsky Uzviz, Kyiv.