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19 May 2009 19:04

Ukraine 3000 Foundation Members Visit Yosyp Bukhanchuk Fine Arts Museum

May 19, 2009, members of the Ukraine 3000 International Charitable Foundation visited Yosyp Bukhanchuk Fine Arts Museum in Kmytiv village, Zhytomyr oblast. Among the participants of the event were director of the cultural projects department Vladyslav Pioro, director for educational programs Oleksandr Oliynyk, and other Foundation staff members.

The museum of Soviet fine arts was founded in 1974, with the “people’s” status given to it in 1975. In 1984 a new building was constructed specially for the museum. It preserves a unique collection of works in Socialistic Realism style. Their authors come from various regions of the USSR: Baltic, Caucasus, Middle Asian republics, Ukraine, Russia’s autonomous republics (Bashkortostan, Yakutia, etc.). It features paintings by Russian academician Moyseyenko, former president of the Leningrad Institute of the Arts Oreshnikov, Nalbandian, Shovkunenko, Hlushchenko, Yablonskaya, along with graphic art by Vereysky, Kasiyan, and sculptures by Belashova and Horevoy. In general, the museum preserves over 3,000 units, with 700 of them on permanent display.

The initiative to create the museum came from a local retired military, World War II veteran Yosyp Bukhanchuk. After the war he had been working at the Leningrad Repin Institute of Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, and Graphic Arts, simultaneously starting a collection of his own. Having retired, Bukhanchuk returned to Ukraine and settled down in Studenytsia village neat Kmytiv, where he had founded the original museum at the village school. He personally donated over 600 works of art to the museum.

The visit was part of the itinerary of the Ukraine 3000 Foundation’s working trip to Zhytomyr oblast.