We invite you to an exhibition of drawings by Oleksa Novakivskyi, created during the First World War.
The exhibition presents the artist’s works, which were kept in a family safe for over a hundred years, and only today have become part of the artistic discourse. The drawings reflect the events and social moods of that period in Galicia, myths and reflections on the catastrophe of the First World War, which has been unjustly forgotten in Ukrainian culture.
Thanks to the efforts of the Novakivsky Family Foundation and art historian Ihor Zhuk, these drawings have come down to us and are becoming visible. The exhibition project is being implemented at the Municipal Art Center with the involvement of experts and co-financing from the ЗMIN Foundation.
In Novakivsky’s drawings, war appears not only as an epic but also as a personal catastrophe. We see the artist recording his experiences of war in a diary.
Oleksa Novakivsky’s series of drawings from the Great War covers a wide range of themes: from premonitions of catastrophe to images of wounds, traumas, fantastic monsters, and mythological images that reflect the chaos and horror of war. But it is also a space for preserving memory and dreams of victory.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
Oleksa Novakivskyi (1872–1935) was born in the village of Slobodo-Obodivka (now Nova Obodivka, Haisyn district, Vinnytsia region). He studied at the Krakow Academy of Arts. In 1913, he moved to Lviv thanks to the efforts of Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytskyi. During the First World War, his works captured the horror and chaos of hostilities; he worked on war-themed graphics, medals, and elements of memorials.
After the war, Novakivskyi remained in Lviv, where in 1923 he founded the Art School, which became the center of the formation of the Ukrainian artistic community. His students made a significant contribution to the development of Ukrainian art.
The artist died in 1935 in Lviv and was buried at the Lychakiv Cemetery. He left behind a vast artistic legacy that we can still discover today.
EXHIBITION TEAM:
Exhibition curator and organizer – Liana Mytsko
Project historian – Ivan Stychynskyi
Exhibition architect – Oleksandr Burlaka
Art historian and drawing archivist – Ihor Zhuk
Technical support – Roman Mamitov
Graphic design – Igor Tymoshchuk
Communications officer – Olya Klymuk
Exhibition manager – Andriy Ivashchuk (currently in the military)
The idea of using ‘safe’ in the exhibition title – Pavlo Kovach (currently in the military)