Vasyl Sokolenko

Biography

Vasyl Sokolenko was born on January 17, 1922 in Petrykivka. in 1941, he graduated from the Petrykivka School of Decorative Painting, where his mentor was Tetiana Pata. Almost immediately, the war broke out.

In the postwar years, he worked as a methodologist at the regional house of folk art, organized an art studio in the village of Ivanivka, which operated on a voluntary basis. Since 1961, he worked in the varnish painting workshop at the Free Peasant Artel, where his mentors were Fedir Panko, Mariia Shyshatska, and Ivan Zavhorodnii. Since 1962, he taught at the Petrykivka branch of the Dnipro Children’s Art School. From 1971 to 1992, he was the chief artist of the Druzhba factory.

After retiring, he built his own house-museum on his estate, the Sokolenko Folk Museum, where he collected more than six hundred exhibits: works of his own, his wife Halyna’s, students and grandchildren. The villagers dubbed it “the Louvre of Petrykivka.” His student Andrii Pikush recalled that the master’s nickname in Petrykivka was “Chapaiev” for the courage with which he would rush to defend the Petrykivka painting.

He lived for ninety-six years. He died on April 26, 2018.

Artistic Practice

Vasyl Sokolenko is one of the greatest innovators of Petrykivka painting. It was his idea to transfer ornaments from paper and walls to wood. He not only painted wooden products, but also taught turners how to make spoons, driftwood, vases, and salad bowls, and was the author of both the form and the painting at the same time. Thanks to him, wooden utensils that had long been used by Zaporizhzhia Cossacks returned from oblivion. For his “Fisherman’s Set” he received the first prize at the republican competition.

Sokolenko’s paintings are characterized by mobility and restlessness, a play of contrasts in color and scale of details. He was able to notice the dynamics of the struggle of all living things in nature and convey it in the ornament. He is also known as the author of the “Petrykivka poster,” a genre in which decorative painting was combined with poster-like expressiveness.

At the Druzhba factory, he created an experimental group of two dozen craftsmen whose products were exclusively exported. He opened the Museum of the History of Decorative Painting at the factory and collected artworks by both old and contemporary Petrykivka artists.

Recognition

Honored Master of Folk Art of Ukraine. Member of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine. Participant of numerous exhibitions in Ukraine and abroad. Founder of the unique private museum-estate of Petrykivka painting in Petrykivka.