Works by Oleksa Hryshchenko to be donated to museums in Ukraine (10/17/04)

Works by Oleksa Hryshchenko to be donated to museums in Ukraine

by Ika Koznarska Casanova

NEW YORK - The works of internationally recognized Ukrainian artist Oleksa Hryshchenko, aka Alexis Gritchenko, (1883-1977), which forms part of important collections and is represented in major museums of Europe and North America, will be donated to museums in Ukraine in accordance with the artist's wish that his work return to his homeland upon Ukraine's independence.

The largest single collection of the artist's paintings and archival material that comprise the holdings of the New York-based Alexis Gritchenko Foundation founded by the artist in 1963, is to be transfered to Ukraine this fall.

A commemorative exhibition titled "Alexis Gritchenko (1883-1977). Travels in Europe: From Cubism to Expressionism," is being held on the occasion of the transfer at the Ukrainian Institute of America, where the collection was housed. The exhibition will open on October 22 and will be on view through November 14. The opening reception is scheduled for Friday, October 22, at 6-8 p.m.

Presiding over the formal act of transfer of the collection in a short ceremony that will precede the opening of the exhibition will be Walter Baranetsky, a member of the foundation's board of trustees. Accepting the transfer of the collection will be Oleksander Fedoruk, head of the State Service for Control of Moving Cultural Treasures over the Border of Ukraine.

Upon the transfer of the collection to Ukraine, works from the collection will be exhibited at the National Art Museum of Ukraine in Kyiv, after which they will be on permanent display and form part of the holdings of the aforementioned institution and the National Museum in Lviv.

Comprising the collection are 31 oil paintings, including works which were exhibited at the Salon d'Automne in Paris; 44 watercolors, gouaches and drawings, including work emanating from the artist's stay in Turkey (1919-1921) as well as travels in Greece, Portugal, Spain and Scandinavia; a kylym produced in the famed workshops of Aubusson, France, copies of which are found in the Museum of Modern Art in Paris and in the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts; and a series of first-editions of books by the artist and monographs. The art work in the collection dates from 1919 to 1963. Also part of the collection are photographs, exhibition catalogues and press materials.

The current exhibition, which draws on works from the collection of the Alexis Gritchenko Foundation, will feature 40 works, including landscapes, genre scenes and still lifes, produced during the artist's frequent travels. Of particular note are watercolors from 1919-1921 that emanate from the artist's stay in Turkey and visits to Greece. The exhibition of these works in leading galleries of Paris gained Hryshchenko recognition in the art world of the 1920s. The works of this period mark the beginning of a distinctive and inspired period of watercolor painting.

A 15-page catalogue, featuring 63 works, has been published in a bi-lingual, English-Ukrainian, edition in conjunction with the current exhibition.

The exhibition is a joint presentation of the Ukrainian Institute of America and The Alexis Gritchenko Foundation. The institute is located at 2 E. 79th St.; gallery hours: Wednesday-Sunday, noon-6 p.m. For additional information call (212) 288-8660 or visit the UIA website, www.ukrainianinstitute.org.

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In 1963 Hryshchenko, who had spent most of his creative life in France, donated more than 70 paintings and watercolors as well as archival material to the Alexis Gritchenko Foundation.

The Foundation was established with the aim of safeguarding the collection of the artist's work, making it available to scholars and in exhibitions to the general public and, when the opportunity arose, transfering the collection to the museums of independent Ukraine.

The original trustees of the foundation, which was incorporated in the State of New York in 1963, were Sviatoslav Hordynsky, initiator and head of the foundation and president of the Ukrainian Artists Association in U.S.A; Jaroslaw Padoch, legal adviser for the foundation; Mr. Baranetsky; and Dr. Walter Hordynsky. Later the board also appointed Augustin Sumyk, Dr. Ilarion Cholhan and Dr. Mykola Kuzmowycz as trustees. (All of the trustees had significant works by leading Ukrainian painters in their private collections, including important works by Hryshchenko.)

Presently, Mr. Baranetsky, the only living member of the board of trustees, represents the foundation.

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In the catalogue to the exhibition, Mr. Baranetsky underscores the importance of the collection's transfer to Ukraine, pointing out that the work of Hryshchenko (as well as of such leading Ukrainian artists as, for example, Alexander Archipenko), while gaining acclaim and recognition abroad, was hardly known in his native land.

Given the political and cultural transformations that shaped Soviet rule, the extant works of such artists was banned or ordered destroyed as they did not comply with the tenets of social realism. The names of the artists, who were deemed personae non gratae, did not appear in Soviet encyclopedias and art history publications.

After Hryshchenko's one-man exhibition at the National Museum in Lviv in 1937, his work was branded as "formalist" and destroyed during the Stalinist years.

The artistic homecoming of the Hryshchenko collection constitutes an invaluable contribution to the cultural heritage of Ukraine, of which the artist felt himself to be an integral part.

Editor's note: A photo montage of Hryshchenko's work as well as a biographical sketch of the artist will appear in the October 24 issue of The Weekly.

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