All those traveling from Boryspil International Airport recently have gotten the chance to enjoy Ukrainian culture by contemplating the best pieces of its art right in the airport hallways.
On Nov. 17 Terminal D of Kyiv Boryspil Airport was turned into an art gallery space as 44 original paintings and six painted plates of Ukrainian artist Maria Prymachenko were put on display.
The Prymachenko artistry exhibition is part of the airport’s Gallery of National Pride, the initiative promoting Ukrainian culture abroad.
Project coordinator of Shcherbenko Art Center Yevheniya Burykina believes that the airport art exhibit makes a good impression.
“I think it’s a good idea. An airport is an appropriate place to exhibit works of art and thereby more people are able to see how interesting and versatile Ukrainian art is,” Burykina says, adding that “Prymachenko works represent best features of Ukrainian folk artistry.”
Prymachenko, who died in 1997 at the age of 88, was one of the most famous representatives of naive art in the world. Her exhibitions in Russia, Poland, Bulgaria, France and Canada were very popular, yet the artist never traveled outside the Soviet Union and led a modest life in her native village of Bolotnya in Kyiv Oblast.
Prymachenko never studied professionally. Her paintings have bright colors and folk symbols. The artist became very famous for paintings of fantastic birds, beasts and plants which Prymachenko harmoniously put among Polissya landscapes in her pictures. In 1937, Spanish artist Pablo Picasso visited her exhibition in Paris and was impressed.
“I admire this miracle, the artistry of the genius Ukrainian,” Picasso was quoted as saying in the World Encyclopedia of Naïve Art published in Belgrade in 1966.
Prymachenko painted more than 800 artworks, nearly 650 of which are exhibited in National Museum of Ukrainian Folk Decorative Art in Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra (9 Lavrska St.).
Ex-President Viktor Yushchenko, sculptor Oleh Pinchuk, ex-Minister for Culture and Tourism Vasyl Vovkun, Petro Poroshenko Bloc’s lawmaker Ihor Hryniv and philanthropist Ihor Voronov are among the dedicated collectors of Prymachenko art.
Mykhaylo Vasylenko, co-owner of the Golden Section auction house, says that today the prices for Prymachenko works vary from $3,000 to $10,000, adding that economic and political crisis in the country has caused the price to drop twice over the past year.
The idea of arranging a Prymachenko exhibition in the airport came up six months ago. Ukrainian art fund Artaniya organized the exhibit. The paintings come from three private art collections. The collectors provided the paintings free of charge.
The Prymachenko exhibition will last until the end of December. In January, the paintings will be replaced with works of other Ukrainian artists.
Apart from at Boryspil Airport, Maria Prymachenko’s works can be seen in the National Museum of Ukrainian Folk Decorative Art (9 Lavrska St.) on the grounds of Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra. The museum is open Wed. – Mon. from 10 a.m. till 6 p.m. Tickets are Hr 10-30.
Kyiv Post staff writer Nataliya Trach can be reached at [email protected]
