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Oleksiy Shovkunenko

Oleksiy Oleksiyovych Shovkunenko (1884–1974) was a prominent Ukrainian painter, a representative of the classical school, an unsurpassed master of watercolour, portrait, and landscape. Professor at the Kyiv Art Institute, People's Artist of the USSR.

Overview

Oleksiy Shovkunenko was born in Kherson. He received his initial art education in a local icon-painting workshop, later graduating from the Odesa Art School (the class of Hennadii Ladyzhensky) and the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts (the workshop of Vasyl Savynsky). For many years he taught, including serving as a professor at the Kyiv Art Institute.

A prominent place in Shovkunenko's work is occupied by watercolour, executed in the wet-on-wet technique ("wet material"). The artist left a substantial legacy of landscape works, including works on Crimean themes, as well as a series of outstanding portraits of his contemporaries. His works are distinguished by colouristic richness and emotional expressiveness.

Key Details / Subtopics

  • Life and creative path: Born in 1884 in Kherson, where he also began his journey in painting. His professional formation took place in Odesa and St. Petersburg, where under the influence of Vasyl Savynsky he became fascinated with watercolour. From 1935 he lived and worked in Kyiv as a professor at the art institute. He died in 1974.
  • Friendship with Pavlo Tychyna: The beginning of the friendship between the poet Pavlo Tychyna and the artist Oleksiy Shovkunenko dates back to 1935 — after both artists moved to the new capital of the Ukrainian SSR, Kyiv. Their families were close, they often spent time together (probably also on the Crimean coast) and supported each other creatively. Oleksiy Shovkunenko created two well-known portraits of the poet — in 1941 and 1966, dedicated to Tychyna's 50th and 75th anniversaries respectively.
  • Crimean inspiration and watercolours: Crimean landscapes occupied a special place in Shovkunenko's landscape painting. Two of his watercolour works from 1949 — "Crimean Landscape" and "Sea near the Coast of Crimea" — are vivid examples of his marine and landscape style. They were gifted to Pavlo Tychyna and are currently preserved and exhibited in the bedroom of the Literary and Memorial Museum-Apartment of P.H. Tychyna in Kyiv. These canvases resonate with the poems of Pavlo Tychyna's "Crimean Cycle" (written in 1926), such as "Ai-Petri" and "Beach" (Plyazh).
  • Mastery of watercolour painting: Shovkunenko preferred to work in watercolour on wet paper. According to the recollections of the poet Hryhorii Donets, during plein air sessions in rainy weather the artist joked: "Well, let it flow, just as long as it flows where we need it to", which demonstrates his virtuoso command of this capricious technique.
  • Content and colour — indivisibility — A document about the Crimean watercolours of Oleksiy Shovkunenko and his many-year friendship with Pavlo Tychyna.
  • Pavlo Tychyna — A prominent Ukrainian poet, close friend and owner of a collection of Oleksiy Shovkunenko's works.
  • Kherson — The city where Oleksiy Shovkunenko was born.