Celebrating the Art of Alexander Shkuropat in Odessa

The Odessa Municipal Museum of Personal Collections named after O.V. Bleshunov has organized an exhibition in memory of the Odessa painter and graphic artist Alexander Yosipovych Shkuropat (1964—2008). This year marks the 60th anniversary of the artist’s birth. In honor of this milestone, admirers are planning to produce a documentary film titled ‘Alexander Shkuropat. Revival’ and a memorial exhibition of painting and graphics called ‘Revival’.

Shkuropat began his journey into painting at the age of ten at a children’s boarding school in Kiliya, Odessa region. His first solo exhibition was held in the summer of 1991, making him the youngest exhibitor at the Odessa Art Museum. Odessa journalist and researcher of Shkuropat’s work, Eduard Ratushnyak, describes the themes of his artworks as ‘keen observations of the periphery’: ‘Even at the first solo exhibition, it was clear that this was an observation of the hidden life of a small Ukrainian village. To look closely and understand them is to smile, to ponder, to be surprised, to cry, or even to burst out laughing’.

Significant events in the artist's career occurred during 1996 and 1997 at the first International Art Festivals ‘Classical Avant-Garde and Contemporary Art of Ukraine’ in Kyiv, where Alexander Shkuropat represented his city alongside other Odessa masters. Over time, his artistic potential was more than sufficient for both large and small collective exhibitions. His works are ‘remembered’ in galleries in Lviv, Zurich, Kyiv, Odessa, Vienna, and other cities.

The ‘Revival’ exhibition at the Bleshunov House showcases paintings from the series ‘Odessa and Its Surroundings’, ‘City of Fish’, ‘My Ukraine’, ‘The Abduction of Europe’. It also includes ‘home’ works left by the artist for himself and his family as reminders of the beginning of his creative journey. These rarities will be seen by the audience for the first time.

The organizers have conditionally divided the exhibition into four parts in the museum’s communicative and exhibition space ‘Apartment No. 6’:
- the first room ‘Students. Painting and Graphics. Exhibition Posters. Mid-80s to 90s of the 20th and 21st centuries’;
- the second room ‘Painting. 80s, 90s of the 20th century – early 21st century’;
- glass stand ‘Albums. Photos. Catalogs. Newspapers. Manuscripts’;
- portfolio ‘Drawings, Engravings. Mid-80s’.

In addition to the works displayed in the ‘Revival’ exhibition, the project curators have over 60 works by Alexander Shkuropat.

The exhibition will run from October 3 to 27. Opening days for visitors: Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, from 11 AM to 5 PM.