KhRMA CONTINUES THE “CHEERS!” PROJECT dedicated to the artists who will be celebrating their anniversaries in 2024. Despite the bloody war and all the extremely difficult challenges that have fallen to our lot, Ukraine is fighting for our Independence, for Freedom, for Identity. For the right to live freely on our land. Our museum is also fighting, popularizing the national art that identifies us as Ukrainians.

Mykhailo’s irresistible desire to become an artist did not disappear even after six unsuccessful attempts to enter an art university. Other people would have been disappointed and said goodbye to their dreams, but not Krasnyk. At first, he worked as a laboratory assistant in a museum, where he was amazed to learn about artworks in person, not through reproductions. With the advice of his experienced colleagues, he began to study professional literature avidly. The next step is to become a restorer’s assistant, and after appropriate training, he will be qualified as a restorer.

Mykhailo Krasnyk: “All my art is a few good people, a few good situations, and the rest depends on you, how you deal with it, how you live. Maybe it’s a good thing I didn’t go to college, because it didn’t take me much time… For me, the main thing is to do what I feel. I can do what I don’t want to do. But there is such a thing as conscience. Someone else can be deceived, but I will know that I did not do what I wanted, but the situation. So I will sin before myself in art, which is the only thing for me that is pure beyond everything? The only one where I feel independent? Because I’m dependent on time, on work, on circumstances, on the tram… And in art I’m independent. Here you can afford everything. Here you do what you want. And how people perceive it is another matter. At first, I painted “normal” still lifes and thought that when my neighbor came over and I painted an apple and she said “oh, how she lives” – that would be the pinnacle of my art, I would stop there, I didn’t need anything else. Well, I painted it, well, she came, well, she said… And I felt that this was not enough for me. No matter how well I can reproduce nature, I still can’t “surpass” it, I can only get closer…”

Mykhailo Krasnyk’s work is a vivid demonstration of how imagination, multiplied by painting culture, knowledge of art history and a masterful combination of various archaic symbols, signs, spots of different formats, simple geometric elements or even a few expressive and dynamic lines and strokes gives rise to compositions that refer the viewer to ancient times, encourage reflection, contemplation and meditation. They immerse us in the millennial past, in the rules of fine art – mysterious Paleolithic cave paintings or petroglyphs. In the childhood of humanity or your own childhood – the choice is yours. After all, abstract art is one of the most democratic areas in terms of interpretation by the viewer. So it’s not necessary to look for specific images and meanings – it’s enough to enter into a visual dialog with the work.

Mykhailo Krasnyk: “My grandmother used to embroider towels like all the older people in the village do. But I couldn’t understand how she did it: she would start sewing from a corner, sew, sew, sew, and sew the entire area. She sewed with a cross stitch and some other stitches, and then she would cut it, and interesting nuances would come out. One day I came home from work, I was sitting on the couch, resting, there was no TV, I looked at the wall, and there was a piece of canvas hanging there, all sewn up with some diamonds, all colored… And I felt that it was pulling me inside, that I was already there. I was so excited, it was so cool! And then I thought – stop! What’s so cool about it? There is nothing there, no image, no bird, no tree… There is only color. And then I realized that I could paint something that would not be a specific image, but it would be interesting.”

REFERENCES:

Mykhailo Krasnyk was born on 18. 11. 1959, Rodatychi village, Lviv region. Painter, graphic artist, restorer.
One of the founders of semiotic abstraction and assemblage in Ukrainian art. His works include experiments with the archetypes of folk art, landscapes, and metaphysical fantasies (Wikipedia).
He combines etching and linocut techniques, introduces elements of collage; uses the technique of comparing contrasting tones, the subtlest nuances of shades of one color. The paintings are characterized by abstraction, appeal to archaic symbolism and folk art (the composition is influenced by folk embroidery). (Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine).
1986 – 1993 – member of the artistic society “Shlyakh”; since 1994 – member of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine.
1975 – 1978 – took private art lessons from Stepan Trush.
Since 1977, he has been working as an artist-restorer at the National Museum named after Andrii Sheptytskyi in Lviv.
Since 1980 – participant in national and international art exhibitions; about 20 personal exhibitions in Ukraine and abroad.
1993 – personal exhibition at the KhRMA.

There are 50 works of the artist in the collection of the KhRMA.