Anyone who has ever prised open a pot of paint and then just sat
\ngazing into the pure, luscious pool will instinctively respond to the
\npaintings of Petro Lebedynets. Here is an artist who is entranced by
\ncolour. He explores its shades and transparencies, its strengths and
\nits subtleties, its harmonies and moods.<\/p>\n
Colour, as any artist, philosopher or physicist knows, is as
\nmysterious as it is elemental. Somehow, the pulsating energy of the
\nelectromagnetic spectrum is converted via the eye’s retina to a
\nsymbolic force. Wavelengths of frequencies of around 650 nanometres,
\nfor instance, impinge on photoreceptive cones which transmit them via
\nthe nervous system to the brain’s cortex where, in a series of
\nincredibly complex cerebral processes we come to recognise them as
\n“red” and hence, working to interpret them by inference and memory, we
\ncome up with such concepts as passion or anger or sin.<\/p>\n
Think about it. What alchemy could be more extraordinary? The radiant
\nenergy of the universe is translated into human emotion. No wonder
\npainters from the first cave daubers to the most progressive
\ncontemporaries have been obsessed. Lebedynets taps into that utterly
\nubiquitous but completely insoluble enigma that lies at the core of
\nhis profession.<\/p>\n
It was Paul Gauguin, apparently, who first opened his eyes to this
\nfascination. Lebedynets, born in Ukraine in 1954, had a classical art
\ntraining at the Kiev State Academy of Arts. He was a practiced figure
\npainter. He had learnt about form and composition, perspective and
\ndesign. But the more that he worked the more he seems to have found
\nhimself moving away from the mimetic and towards the atmospheric, away
\nfrom the illustrative surface and towards the spirit inside. Gauguin’s
\nbold Polynesian patterns imprinted themselves on his imagination.<\/p>\n
“Colour! What a deep and mysterious language!” cried Gauguin. To him
\nit spoke “the language of dreams”. It was like music, “a matter of
\nvibrations” and so reached “that which is most general and therefore
\nindefinable in nature: its inner power.”<\/p>\n
It is this “inner power” that Lebedynets is seeking to speak of in
\ncanvases that range in size from small prismatic meditations to
\neye-flooding colour-fields. Some have titles: signposts to help the
\nspectator at least start off in the right direction. But they can’t be
\nfollowed for long. Lebedynets, like Gauguin, knows that there is no
\nsimple logical progression. The further you go, the more paths open
\nup.<\/p>\n
The artist pursues these by instinct and practice. He learns that,
\nthough there are no more than five primaries, in combination they
\nproduce more hues and tones than can ever be counted. He finds out
\nwhich are the friends of their neighbours and which are the lovers of
\ntheir opposites. He discovers which are noble and which vulgar, which
\nstrong and which subdued, which calm and consoling and which stirring
\nand exciting.<\/p>\n
Why do two colours put one next to the other sing?” asked Pablo
\nPicasso. Lebedynets, like this great modern master, may often wonder.
\nNeither he nor his spectators will ever find the answer. But they will
\ncertainly know when they have had the experience.<\/p>\n
Rachel Johnston,
\n\u0430\u0440\u0442-\u043a\u0440\u0438\u0442\u0438\u043a The Times<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Anyone who has ever prised open a pot of paint and then just sat gazing into the pure, luscious pool will instinctively respond to the paintings of Petro Lebedynets. Here is an artist who is entranced by colour. He explores its shades and transparencies, its strengths and its subtleties, its harmonies and moods. Colour, as …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8908,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-769","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-journal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/769","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=769"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/769\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8989,"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/769\/revisions\/8989"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=769"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=769"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lebedynets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=769"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}