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Portrait of the Son Oleksandr (Reverse: Saint Anthony the Great)

Mykola Fediuk

Basic information

ID: Ж-5808
Author: Mykola Fediuk
Name: Portrait of the Son Oleksandr (Reverse: Saint Anthony the Great)
Date of creation: 1930s
Country: the Ukrainian SSR
Technique: oil painting tempera painting
Material: canvas oil
Dimensions (height x width, cm): 46.5 x 39.5

Additionally

Type: painting
Genre: portraiture religious
Plot: Portrait
Provenance: Purchased from O. Fediuk, 1983

Information about author

Author: Mykola Fediuk
Artist's lifetime: 1885–1962
Country: Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Ukrainian SSR, now Ukraine
Biography: Mykola Fediuk (February 26, 1885, Golubtsi village (now Brody district) – May 17, 1962, Vynnyky town) was a figurative artist, painter, graphic artist, and teacher. Between 1896 and 1903, he received his primary education at Brody Gymnasium; later, between 1903 and 1907, he studied in Lviv Gymnasium. From 1907 to 1908, Mykola Fediuk attended the Faculty of Law of Lviv University. The circumstances of Mykola Fediuk’s acquaintance with Andrey Sheptytsky are unknown, but it was thanks to the Metropolitan's patronage that the future artist had the opportunity to start studying at the Krakow Academy of Arts. Between 1910 and 1916, the artist studied at the Krakow Academy, and later at the Munich Academy of Arts. He was the author of picturesque portraits and landscapes, such as “Cypresses” (1910), “Chapel in Lviv” (1910), “Self-Portrait” (1915), and others. All these works have been preserved in the funds of the Andrey Sheptytsky National Museum in Lviv. He was also the author of articles on artistic topics. In general, the funds of the National Museum in Lviv house fifty paintings by Mykola Fediuk, dating from the 1910s to the 1950s. Mykola Fediuk has proved himself not only as a painter and graphic artist but also as a fine art critic and an excellent teacher. For some time, he lived in Brody, where he worked as a professor at the Jozef Korzeniowski State Gymnasium from 1923 to 1927. From 1934, the artist lived in the town of Vynnyky on Nova Street, 7 (now Mykola Fediuk Street). From 1947 to 1950, after the Second World War, Mykola Fediuk was a teacher and then head of the graphics department at the Institute of Decorative Arts in Lviv. In 1975, at the Lviv Museum of Ukrainian Art, Mykola Fediuk's first personal exhibition took place to mark the artist's 90th birthday (unfortunately, posthumously). In 1969, a fire in the Vynnyky house destroyed all the author's works in the attic. The master rightfully took a prominent place in the history of Ukrainian art of the twentieth century. Mykola Fediuk died and was buried in Vynnyky.

Object description

The work is an intimate portrait of the artist's younger son, executed in the impasto technique. The total height of the vertical composition features a bust-length depiction of a small boy in a slight half-turn to the left. The silver-grey drapery serving as the background for the portrait harmoniously contrasts with the child's clothing: a yellow-brown shirt with a high collar and a purple beret. The boy appears weary from posing and looks sorrowfully off to the side. On the reverse side of the portrait, during restoration in 2021, an iconographic depiction of Saint Anthony the Great, executed in tempera, was discovered and attributed. The image was concealed beneath a layer of white paint. The painting depicts an older man with a long white beard, dressed in light grey robes, sitting in front of the entrance to a cave. Near his bare feet on the ground lies an open book. The saint's head is tilted towards the palm of his left hand while his right hand rests on his knees. The man's eyes are closed. The work includes attributes characteristic of the iconography of the saint (the cave, the book, and the tree). The artist has portrayed Saint Anthony the Great in a moment of prayerful calm – he seems to have leaned towards the valley and is listening intently. Such a scene corresponds to the legend's text about the saint's life. Mykola Fediuk frequently explored themes related to the life of Saint Anthony the Great in his graphic series from the 1920s, notably in works such as "Thirst" and "The Temptation of Saint Anthony". In terms of style, the scene is also similar to another early work by M. Fediuk, "Ivan Vyshenskyi". This suggests that the work was likely created in the 1910s or 1920s.

Legal regulation

Borys Voznytskyi Lviv National Art Gallery

Portrait of the Son Oleksandr (Reverse: Saint Anthony the Great)

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