In fall the artist will celebrate her anniversary and the current exhibition can be viewed as a dress rehearsal for the celebration since it presents the artistic heritage of Oksana Odainyk. The exposition features nearly 100 paintings of the talented artist. This exhibition is dedicated to contemporary landscape and still life, since Odainyk received Serhii Shyshko Prize and became a laureate of Fedir Krychevsky for outstanding creative achievements in this area. It is very touching to see the paintings made by the artist in the 1960s when she was still a student. These are the still life Candle Light 1968 and two still lifes with Hutsul souvenirs, brought by Oksana’s parents from their trip to Transcarpathian region. Right next to these paintings there is a portrait of the artist’s husband – Mykhailo Dvoiehlazov and her daughter (Katia Standing Next to the Window).
Odainyk continues the dynasty of famous Kyiv painters Zoia Samoilenko and Vadym Odainyk. After graduating from Taras Shevchenko Republican Art School the talented girl continued her studies at the Kyiv Art Institute.
Upon defending her diploma, Odainyk enthusiastically painted beautiful landscapes in Sedniv Art House, where she had an opportunity to observe the creative process of the classic of Ukrainian painting art Tetiana Yablonska and got inspiration from her advice.
In the second half of the 1980s Odainyk went to the Crimea as a part of a creative team that brought together promising young painters from Kyiv and Moscow. She painted monochrome, somewhat mystical landscapes with rigid compositional scheme and expressive texture. Companionship with prominent representatives of the Crimean school – Valentyna Tsvietkova, Fedir Zakharov, and Volodymyr Tolochko left unforgettable memories and desire to find her own note in each sketch. Trips to Transcarpathia, Chernihiv, Spain, and France gave the artist lots of etude material that later became the foundation for landscapes luxurious in color range (part of this legacy remains today in the leading Ukrainian museums and private collections).
The current exhibition presents both the landscapes well known to the Ukrainian audience and new paintings, including The City; Fall Day; All in Garden; Glow; Flood. Overflow made in 2013, as well as an excellent series “The Seasons.” The artist believes that the source of her inspiration is the poetry of the soul and the great colors of Ukrainian landscapes with fragrant flowers and grass. After the abstract period the artist returned to her favorite genres, experimenting with colors and expressive decorative manner. Wet flower petals, elastic buds, lush greenery, bottomless sky, and warm ground as if stand still in the bumpy from paint texture canvases, convey to us the luxury of summer bloom and joy of life.
Fans of a gifted artist from Kyiv have long been fond of the “shamanistic” power of her bright improvisations, in the mysterious rhythm of light and shadow, the very essence of romantic and tragic paintings. Every new painting is always a great joy and intrigue. Today in the studio of the artist you can see very bold paintings filled with vitalistic “Apollonic beginning” – typical feature of the talented artist’s career. Her palette is oversaturated with colors of joy, love, desire “to taste the food of gods,” in short, this exhibition is a kind of art therapy and a chance to immerse yourself into the world of beauty.