Volodymyr Nosan (b. 1970), Blaha Mucha and her children, 2022
Oil on canvas. 45 х 100 cm
Signed in lower right corner, title* at top.
* The title is a linguistic joke - the Ukrainian expression "blaha mucha" means "discontent", similar to the Polish "water tap".
*
Volodymyr Nosan - painter, graphic artist, book illustrator. The influence of Far Eastern art and Ukrainian engravings, post-impressionism and modernism, the style of the art masters of the 1960s are noticeable in the artist's work. Nosan creates portraits, landscapes, narrative painting. The basis of his work is color, playing a structural and decorative role at the same time. Its color palette is extremely wide: from bright, warm and cold colors to almost monochromatic, "muted" works.
His works often feature seemingly banal subjects - domestic animals, local landscapes, scenes from rural life - often drawn from his own memories and experiences. However, processed under the influence of time, thought and subjected to stylistic treatments, they acquire an almost archetypal - symbolic and philosophical, sometimes social - character, as in folk painting. The artist rejects anecdotal elements, creating precise, almost allegorical compositions, with carefully considered colors. At the same time, the artist does not hesitate to evoke the drama of many life situations: loss of home, exile, displacement, escape.
In Nosan's work, we also often find female figures, still lifes - especially flowers and fruits, but also landscapes of Ukraine and other countries, observed in travels or plein air. However, as in other types of painting, observation of nature is only a starting point for the artist, which later undergoes metamorphosis under the influence of his own thoughts. Thus, the paintings become new, independent universes, full of color and meaning.
[VZ]
