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Art has never been unchangeable. It is evident that Ukrainian
art could not grow stiff. As far back as the revolution, we had
Futurists and Constructivists and Cubists. All that was choked from
above. In 1963, the destroyer of Ukrainian Avant-garde, art critic Kuriltseva, complacently summed up the results of her activities: "Where have the once notorious Bohomazov and the Pastukhov brothers vanished? They disappeared from art without trace, as if they had never existed."* Her generation triumphed: Khrushchev himself headed the struggle against abstractionism and other 'isms/ They persecuted leftists for decades, killed the Boichukists, in 1937, in the People's Commissariat for Public Education, burnt down portraits of 'the enemies of the people' painted by Petrytsky, cut paintings by Sedlyar, Shekhtman and Hvozdyk in the Kyiv Museum of Russian Art, in 1952, passed death sentences to canvases by Palmov, Bohomazov and others in the Museum of Ukrainian Fine Arts, and, in the same year, destroyed works by Arkhypenko, Kovzhun and Narbut in Lviv, and fired Yermylov and Synyakova from the Artists Union for their pro-Western moods. Meanwhile, the youth of the 1960s tried to find information on Ukrainian Avant-garde art and discovered a hot mainland of Ukrainian art history. They sought out the survived Boichukists and Constructivists Pavlenko, Yermylov, Bizyukov, Vrona, Pecharkovska, Kolos, and the widows and relatives of the deceased Bohomazova, Petrytska, Redko, Zhdanko, Khvostenko, and Manevych. They searched in the funds, archives and libraries. They also informed collectors Sigalov, Ivakin, Sveshnikov and Lobanov-Rostovsky, as well as consulted with researchers from Moscow, Leningrad, Warsaw, Paris, and the USA. They risked their careers and freedom to penetrate Ukrainian diaspora 'In search of the time past." A counter current of interest was from Western art historians, specializing in Russian art, who told each other "Go to Kyiv, there is Bohomazov." As it turned out, the roots of Russian Avant-garde could be found in Ukraine. For example, what was Goncharova's paintings inspired with? — the Polovtsian stone images on the steppes of Ukraine. Which cities were associated with the life and work of the Futurist and trans-rationalist Terentyev? — Kherson, Kharkiv, Odessa and Dnipropetrovsk. Why did Malevych make such frequent mentions of Pymonenko and "the famous master from Chernihiv, Murashko" in the last years of his life? What does the title of Exter's painting, Fundukleyivska at Night, mean? How can you explain why Davyd Burlyuk called himself a 'Tartar-Za-porozhian Futurist'? How did it happen that Matyushin, prohibited in Leningrad, was readily published in Kharkiv? Deciding these questions, some Western historians of Russian art became historians of Ukrainian Avant-garde as well (the Marcades — France, Boiko — Poland, Bowlt — the USA, Nakov — France, Mudrak — the USA). Furthermore, well-known London art collector, Mr. Lobanov-Rostovsky, collects sketches by stage designers of the Kyiv school, Exter, Meller, Petrytsky, Khvostov, Rabynovych, Tyshler and Chelishchev. At the 1988 exhibition of his collection of paintings in Moscow, he told me with conviction: 'You must write a book on five uniquely gifted Ukrainian artists: Arkhypenko, Bohomazov, Exter, Yermylov and Petrytsky." I gladly consented to this proposition adding to the list some more names — Malevych, Palmov, Tatlin, Burlyuk and Boichuk. These are the great names around which dozens of students and adherents grouped establishing various art trends, schools and currents. Through them, Ukrainian culture was rapidly Europeanized, while in Europe and America it began to breathe with Rus-Ukraine. Unfortunately, Stalin's terror cut off informatbn of Ukrainian art to the world. ...The notion 'Ukrainian Avant-garde' was introduced by Paris art critic, Nakov, in reference to the exhibition, Tatlin's Dream, held in London in 1973. For the first time ever, the West saw world-class works by Yermylov and Bohomazov, two obscure Avant-gardists from Ukraine. Their works brought to mind the names of world-famous masters whose origin, education, self-perception and national traditions were linked with Kyiv, Kharkiv, Lviv, Odessa and with the Ukrainian cultural tradition in general. Among them were Burlyuk, "the most faithful son of Ukraine," the Pole, Malevych, who considered himself to be a Ukrainian; Tatlin, professor of the Kyiv Art Institute and bandura-player; Exter, the founder of the Ukrainian school of constructivist stage design. And lastly, Arkhypenko, who was inspired by his indelible impressions of his homeland, the magic of the Tripillya civilizatbn. the archaic Polovtsian stone images, the resonant contours of mosaics in the St. Sophia of Kyiv and reliefs of St. Michael's Cathedral of the Golden Domes, and the colours of folk ceramics. Dmytro Gorbachev, *V. Kuriltseva. On the Question of National Roots in Painting// Tvorchestvo. 1963. No. 9 |
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