On April 16th and 17th, an exhibition of Maria Prymachenko’s works opened in Strasbourg with our support, and we would like to share the conclusions from this event.
This exhibition is significant as it draws attention to Ukraine’s cultural heritage: its beauty, uniqueness, and the destruction it is currently facing, emphasizing the need for its preservation and protection.
Maria Prymachenko is a Ukrainian painter who worked in the “naïve art” genre and was a laureate of the Taras Shevchenko National Prize of Ukraine, National Artist of Ukraine.
Mariia Prymachenko was born in 1908 in the small village of Bolotnia in the Kyiv region. She started painting only at the age of 17.
One day, she found some bluish clay and decided to paint her house with it. The villagers liked the image of the house so much that the neighbors asked the girl to paint their house as well. This was the beginning of her artistic career.
In 1936, Maria Oksentiyivna was invited to the Kyiv Museum of Ukrainian Art to attend experimental workshops.
Her work became much more diverse, and Maria painted, created ceramics, and embroidered.
In 1937, Maria Prymachenko’s paintings were exhibited in Paris. Pablo Picasso, who was also there, noted that if Mariia Prymachenko had lived in France, she could have become much more famous than he was. At the same exhibition, Maria Prymachenko received a gold medal.
Her paintings were also presented at international exhibitions in Warsaw, Sofia, Montreal, and Prague.
But the Second World War made the artist forget about her art for a while. Having returned to her native village, Maria went through the most terrible period of her life – her husband died in the war. He never saw his son Fedir.
In 1960, the National Artist began work on her new cycle entitled “For the Joy of People”.
Maria Prymachenko was awarded the Taras Shevchenko State Prize of Ukraine for the newly created series.
Shortly before her death, the artist created a beautiful Chornobyl series that was sold all over the world.
In 1997, the great artist passed away.
This event has been co-organized by our marketing agency from which Taras Gorbul and Anatolii Kompanichenko were involved and Kyiv Gallery Sofia-A with support of the Maria Prymachenko Family Foundation.
The exhibition aims to prompt everyone to reflect deeper on the significance of Ukrainian culture in the European and global context.
We care about the development and promotion of Ukrainian culture, which is why we support such events.
Many visitors expressed gratitude for the opportunity to see Maria Prymachenko’s paintings. It was heartening to see that many people were familiar with her work, while others who were just introduced to it acknowledged her unique talent and requested that exhibitions be showcased to a wider audience in museums and other spaces.
This underscores the importance of our heritage. Additionally, although other countries were represented at the opening, we attracted the largest crowd.
We would like to thank our partners and everyone involved in the exhibition: Sofia-A and the Maria Prymachenko Family Foundation, Ruslan Stefanchuk, Maria Mezentseva, Theodoros Roussopoulos, and Marija Pejčinović Burić.
Taras Gorbul – Founder & CEO Superheroes.marketing
Anatolii Kompanichenko – Partner & COO Superheroes.marketing
