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Portrait of Mykhailyna Stefanovych

Petro Kholodnyi (the Elder)

Basic information

ID: Фмз-Ж-161
Author: Petro Kholodnyi (the Elder)
Name: Portrait of Mykhailyna Stefanovych
Date of creation: 1923
Country: russian empire Ukrainian People's Republic
Culture: Eastern Europe
Technique: oil painting
Material: canvas oil
Dimensions: 64.5 x 45 cm (height x width)

Additionally

Type: painting
Genre: portraiture
Provenance: Yaroslava Muzyka Fund
Exposition: Lozinski Palace

Information about author

Author: Petro Kholodnyi (the Elder)
Author in the original: Petro Kholodnyi
Artist's lifetime: 1875–1930
Country: russian empire, Ukrainian People's Republic
Biography: Petro Kholodnyi (the Elder) – Ukrainian statesman, public figure, member of the Central Council of Ukraine, Minister of National Education of the Ukrainian People's Republic, artist, chemist. Painter-impressionist with lyrical leanings, neobyzantist, painter, muralist, graphic artist, art designer and pedagogue. Father of artist Petro Kholodnyi. During the Ukrainian revolution (1917–1921) he worked at the secretariat of national education of the Ukrainian Central Council and the Ministry of Education. At first, he studied in the Kyiv gymnasium, and during the last two years of a gymnasium, he attended evening classes at Mykola Murashko's Kyiv Drawing School, where he got an art education. After graduating in 1897 from the Faculty of Natural Sciences at Kyiv University with a degree in mathematics and mineralogy, he taught (from 1898) at the Kyiv Technical School in the physics department. After graduating in 1897 from the Faculty of Natural Sciences at Kyiv University with a degree in mathematics and mineralogy, he taught (from 1898) at the Kyiv Technical School in the physics department.
After the Ukrainian People's Republic occupation, he emigrated with its government to Tarnów in West Galicia (Poland). In 1921 he moved to Mykolaiv in the Lviv region and in 1922 to Lviv. In the same year, at the initiative of emigrants from Eastern Ukraine, the Circle of Ukrainian Art Workers was created in Lviv, which he headed. The club united artists, writers and architects, and existed till 1927. The iconographer Mykhailyna Stefanovych-Olshanska was one of Petro Kholodnyi 's pupils at that time. The 1920s were the years of his active artistic work in Lviv. He demonstrated his works of painting, easel painting and decorative art at exhibitions in Lviv (1922, 1923, 1924 and 1926), and in 1929, he took part in an exhibition of Ukrainian books organized by the publishing house "Western Ukraine". In 1927 he took part in the exhibition of Ukrainian graphic art in Belgium, where he presented an exhibition of Ukrainian engravings and book graphic art.
The Lviv period was the richest in the creativity of Kholodnyi. Here he began painting, restoring icons (including the Zarwanicka icon of Our Lady in 1921–1922), doing murals and designing stained-glass windows.
During his stay in Lviv in 1928, he decided to go to Paris to collect material for a future painting dedicated to the death of Simon Petliura. He collected the necessary material, but the idea remained unrealized. He wrote several scientific works, which were published with funds from the National Scientific School. Died on 7 June 1930 in Warsaw.

Object description

In the background of the winter landscape is a belted image of a woman in a brownish-ochre winter coat, underlined by a thin blue-ochre sash and decorated with an image of postols (kind of shoes). On the woman's head is a hat. Mykhailyna Stefanovych, a student and follower of Petro Kholodnyi, was involved in the restoration of icons and icon painting and graphics. She also designed costumes, namely women's hats.

Inscriptions

In the bottom right is the author's signature and date: «P. Kholodnyi/1923/ Mykolaiv»

Portrayed person