OBITUARY: Omelian Mazuryk, artist and iconographer, 65
PARIS - Noted Ukrainian painter and iconographer Omelian Mazuryk died in Paris on November 13, 2002, at the age of 65.
The artist was best known for his religious paintings, done in a neo-Byzantine style, with his work generally characterized as a synthesis of expressionism, Ukrainian-Byzantine and folk art traditions. Mr. Mazuryk's iconostasis for the Cathedral of St. Volodymyr in Paris serves as a fine example of contemporary Ukrainian church art.
Among his commissions as an iconographer, Mr. Mazuryk painted the iconostases in the chapels of the Shevchenko Scientific Society in Sarcelles, France, and the Holy Spirit Ukrainian Catholic Seminary in Ottawa.
In 1990 Mr. Mazuryk had a solo exhibition in Lviv and was invited to teach the painting of icons at the Lviv Institute of Applied and Decorative Arts.
Apart from church art, Mazuryk painted compositions and landscapes.
Mr. Mazuryk was born February 2, 1937, in Brezhava, Poland, into a Ukrainian Lemko family. The family suffered the fate of most Ukrainians in the region when in 1947 it was forcibly resettled as part of Akcja Wisla. The family started life anew near Wroclaw, where Mr. Mazuryk subsequently attended art school.
Mr. Mazuryk graduated from the Academy of Art in Krakow in 1964, and, in 1967, left for Paris to study at L'Ecole des Beaux Arts. Since leaving Poland he lived and worked in Paris.
His first solo exhibition was held in 1972 in Paris. Numerous other exhibitions followed in France, Belgium, Germany, Canada and the United States.
Solo exhibitions of Mr. Mazuryk's work were held in Paris in 1972, 1973 and 1975. Among select group exhibitions in Paris were exhibits held at the Salon d'Autumn (1970); Salon d'Art Sâcré (1971), at which Mr. Mazuryk won first prize; Salon des Artists Français, 1971, 1972; Gallerie Cimaise 1972, 1973, 1974; and Gallerie Miron François, 1972.
Among exhibits in the United States were exhibits at the Museum of Modern Art in Boston, as well as in Toronto and in Philadelphia in 1973.
Mr. Mazuryk is survived by his wife, Odarka, and two sons, Sviatoslav and Boian.
Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, February 9, 2003, No. 6, Vol. LXXI
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