Realism parade

Fine Art Ukraine has existed for three years. In this period of time its tasks haven’t changed. The forum overviews all genres of domestic visual art: painting, drawing, sculpture and photography. A large exhibition called “The School” is central to this year’s forum. It includes works by major figures in Ukrainian art, notably those of graduates of the National Aca-demy of Fine Arts and Architecture.

Actually, the exhibit, assembled from the academy’s vaults, is a representative selection of Ukrainian realism over the last century. The earliest works, the charcoal drawings by Oleksii Shovkunenko are dated 1910-11. Almost all of the more or less known Ukrainian artists studied in the building on Smyrnova-Lastochkina Street. These include: Tetiana Holembiievska, Sergei Grigoriev, Oleksandr Danchenko, Vasyl Zabashta, Viktor Zaretsky, Vladimir Kostetsky, Alexander Lopukhov, Anatolii Plamenytsky, Mykola Storozhenko, Mykhailo Khmelko, Tetiana Yablonska and Heorhii Yakutovych. Many of these artists deserve that whole books be written about their creative work.

Traditionally, the main exhibit is accompanied by a parade of galleries: 15/5, O’ART, Pit-Art, ART.ERY, Art-Boulevard, The Victory Gardens, The Green Sofa, The Art Collection, and Person. These present modern artists, such as Yurii Vakulenko, Iryna Veshtak-Ostromenska, Olha Hrebeniuk, Vasyl Hurin, Volodymyr Hurin, Viktor Deisun, Olena Dudnichenko, or Vladyslav Shereshevsky. As usual the selection principles were hard to comprehend: a lot of galleries exhibited undisguised kitsch, better suited for Andriivsky uzviz than for an exhibition like Fine Art Ukraine.

However, that is the problem of modern art. In fact, “The School” is a master class compared to the works of topical painters. The patriarchs’ canvases don’t show notorious milkers, metallurgists or proletariat leaders, but technically perfect and bright portraits, poetic and charming landscapes, virtuosic drawings on historical and folk themes. The works created by Tetiana Yablonska, Anatolii Plamenytsky, Zoya Lerman, Tetiana Holembiievska and others back in the 1930s-1960s still look fresh and live certain internal lives, as do all works of artistic genius.

Among the representatives of the younger generation in the gallery section Vladyslav Shereshevsky and Olena Pryduvalova deserve to be singled out. The former has a perfect sense of humor and is able to create an atmosphere of surrealism that is not so evil. In turn, Pryduvalova amazed the audience by her latest series of urbane paintings, in which she completely changed her colors and themes: only really talented artists can change so dramatically.