Works by artists from Canada and Ukraine sold at fund-raiser (04/25/99)

Works by artists from Canada and Ukraine sold at fund-raiser

by Yuriy Diakunchak

TORONTO - The parish hall of St. Mary's Ukrainian Catholic Church in Mississauga, Ontario, was transformed on April 2-4 into a mini art mart. Thirty-six artists from Canada and Ukraine offered their works for sale - works that ranged from icons to pottery, from engravings of kozaks to oil paintings steeped with symbolism.

The art sale was organized by the parents' committee of the Sadochok nursery school, based at the church, as a fund-raiser for school. Some of the participating artists came from as far away as Elliot Lake in northwestern Ontario, Montréal, Lviv and St. Petersburg, Russia. However, most were from the Golden Horseshoe area of southern Ontario.

According to Marichka Hlibovych-Duncan, president of the Sadochok parents committee, the sale has been held annually for more than 10 years. Artists are recruited mostly by word of mouth.

Artists donate 30 percent of each sale to the school. Each artist also donated a work to be raffled. "There's a real variety of work that people haven't seen yet which I find very exciting," said Ms. Hlibovych-Duncan. "There's a painting for all price ranges," she added.

Individual works could be had for as low as $40 (Canadian), while a few were selling for thousands of dollars. Multi-media artist Oleh Lesiuk, who remembers participating in five of the annual shows, has had generally positive results in previous years.

"I've always managed to sell something. It's a well-organized event, with a nice atmosphere," Mr. Lesiuk said. He tends to bring both lower-priced items that appeal to a general audience and more expensive works targeted at collectors. "Coming to the opening is great because you can meet other artists, trade ideas, and get feedback from people as to what they are looking for."

Mr. Lesiuk, who is also the acting curator at the Ukrainian Canadian Art Foundation (UCAF) gallery, added that the crowd the "church art mart" draws is different from the one that gathers at the UCAF.

Roman Babej, an insurance adjuster from Etobicoke, a Toronto suburb, recently bought a house and came to buy a painting. He purchased a woodcut by Bohdan Holowacki and noted that he hopes it will be the first of many Holowackis that he'll own, since he likes the artists' style.

Another potential buyer had her eye on Oleh Savytskyi's work. "I love Savytskyi. I love his churches. They look so authentic, and Holowacki's icons are superb," said Hanya Ostapiuk, who teaches at St. Sophia School in Mississauga.

Sales were fast and furious on opening day. Roman Chwyl of Etobicoke said: "I was looking at this artist's work, considering buying one piece and a couple came up and took away all six, leaving me wondering what just happened." The works in question were drawings of Ukrainian women in traditional costume by Nadia Stanovoytova from Lviv.

Mr. Chwyl then switched his attention to the works of Adrian Baranowski. Not yet well-known to the general art buying community, the Lviv-born Mr. Baranowski is sure to attract some attention with his funkadelic acrylics of Lviv street scenes. Mr. Baranowski has been in Canada for only three years and has participated in one previous group show, at UCAF.

"I have a hard time describing my style. I'm just beginning to experiment," said Mr. Baranowski. Like many immigrants, he had to postpone his creativity in order to secure himself financially. "Before I didn't have time to paint because I had to work to support my family, but now I have more time."

Petro Magdenko, who came from distant Elliot Lake, was not as confident that his acrylics of nature scenes would be as popular as those of Ms. Stanovoytova and others. "I sold a lot of work here last year, but this year my nose tells me there will be no sale," he said.

The most distant traveler had to be Viktor Tsapko from St. Petersburg. He arrived in Canada in December 1998, bringing a number of works with him. On a previous trip to Canada he participated in a group show at the UCAF with three other artists.

Mr. Tsapko said he is drawing inspiration from his surroundings in Canada. "Everything in Canada is interesting through the eyes of a Petersburgher. Native culture is very attractive to me. They have interesting symbolism in their art," he explained. Mr. Tsapko said he hopes to travel to the Rockies to commit the vistas there to canvas. Mr. Tsapko sold a couple of his works during the course of the event.

According to Ms. Hlibowych-Duncan, Sadochok received over $4,000 on sales of approximately $14,000 and "we were very happy with the results."

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