By Leonid KHOMYAKOV
Looking at leather sculptures created by Ihor Kopchyk and now exhibited
at the Kyiv Taras Shevchenko Museum, you are instantly reminded of a fur-coated
tea set by the classic surrealist Meret Oppenheim, first of all, because
of a paradoxical choice of material the artist made.
It is, of course, impossible to make a three-dimensional sculpture out
of leather unless you are a magician, but what you can do is show the relief.
Many visitors to the exhibition are amazed: the impression is the items
are made of bronze. In reality, as the artist revealed his secret, all
the items were made of leather, very coarse, the type used for making shoe
soles, but finished under the author's personal technique. But the artist
is famous not only by his trademark leather-making recipes but also by
an extraordinary fineness of his works, stylized as Italian Quattrocento.
In my opinion, the low relief has never caused people to feel such a genuine
delight since the times of the famous royal gate executed by famous Florentines
Lorenzo Ghiberti and Filippo Brunelleschi.
The artist creates in the basement of an old Lviv building. He refuses
point-blank to move to brighter and more spacious premises. He also adores
to present his works, in person, to world figures. Pope John Paul II, Leonid
Kravchuk, and Leonid Kuchma only begin the list of his influential patrons.






