1945 – 2000s

Ukrainian Diaspora Modernism

Модернізм української діаспори

The modernist current developed by Ukrainian artists who left Ukraine during and after the Second World War and rebuilt their careers in the displaced-persons camps of Germany and then in New York, Paris, Toronto and Chicago. Working outside Soviet censorship, they absorbed abstraction, expressionism and post-war European painting while keeping Ukrainian subject matter, sacred architecture and identity in view. Institutional anchors included the Association of Ukrainian Artists in America (OMUA), the New York Group, the Ukrainian Institute of America and the Ukrainian Museum in New York.

Artists of the Movement

Liuboslav Hutsaliuk

1923–2003

Liuboslav Hutsaliuk was a Lviv-born painter who emigrated to New York in 1949 and became one of the leading figures of Ukrainian diaspora modernism. Working between studios in New York and Paris, he built a distinctive body of cityscapes in which cathedral spires, rooftops and bridges dissolve into thick vertical impasto and two- or three-note colour harmonies.

Works from this Movement

1959

Old Town

Liuboslav Hutsaliuk

A dense old-European townscape of gabled roofs, arcades and pointed spires reduced to a lattice of olive, ochre and coral impasto against a flat yellow sky. Signed and dated lower right 'Hutsaliuk 1959', it is a fully characteristic example of the 'gothicised' city pictures that made his reputation in Paris.

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1966

Boats

Liuboslav Hutsaliuk

A small, heavily worked panel of moored boats, showing how Hutsaliuk carried the same vertical impasto and narrow colour range from his large city canvases into intimate formats.

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