Alexander Zhyvotkov. REVELATION

Alexander Zhyvotkov is a prominent Ukrainian artist who burst onto the art scene as part of the Ukrainian New Wave movement in the early- to mid-1990’s.

The New Wave is a turbulent and exciting part of the national history of art. Zhyvotkov’s unique style and deliberately minimalist technique together with his exceptional monochrome and melancholy poetic style make him stand out from the crowd.  Zhyvotkov’s work is immediately recognised by art lovers who specially value authentic work; the artist is famous for his dark backgrounds, expressive lines and shapes. The viewer is under the impression that Zhyvotkov’s hand is guided by time, as if time itself is painting a canvas, or carving on wood and in stone. 

The Revelation exhibition project follows Zhyvotkov’s artistic journey. The project began with his artwork created in 2013-2014 to commemorate the Ukrainian Revolution of Dignity, through work from 2015-2019 where Zhyvotkov reflects on the fickle nature of history and, finally, to large-scale works in the present day. 

His artwork is a testament. It testifies to the fact that genuine art exists outside of time, it is born in the here and now but always faces both the past and the future. Zhyvotkov’s motto in art is similar to what the philosopher and art historian Richard Tarnas once wrote – ‘the deepest passion of the Western mind has been to reunite with the ground of its own being.’ 

In the past decades Ukrainians together with the rest of the world have been unwittingly thrown into the process of creating new history. At a time of trouble people naturally ponder over the eternal questions which have bothered mankind for generations, how to protect lives, defend our home, and preserve our culture.

We, together with the artist, find strength and inspiration in the land’s tumultuous past, in the cathedrals once raised to the ground and then rebuilt, in the rolling hills over the Borisphenus-Dnipro, in the ballads sung by chumaks, the travelling merchants, and images of saints carved by Pinsel.