Olena Onufriv

Passion

It is quite clear now that Olena Onufriv is one of the most successful artists of the new generation. The secret of her success is probably rooted in the distinguishable and striking style of painting that reflects her radiant personality and positive attitude to life. Though being a resident of the northern latitudes she has a “southern” world-view with its sensuality and passion, enjoyment of life and love for beauty in all its manifestations. As an artist she possesses a specifically “southern” acute sensitivity to the form that allows her to create positively visual art – that kind of art which is a real feast for our eyes. This reveals itself in her every piece of painting: bright, almost ecstatic colours; lavish, generous manner of laying paint with pastose strokes that creates glossy, shimmering and utterly material surface of her works; fragmented but still self-sufficient compositions that depict only little things and moments making them important and worth our attention. Thus we have art of overwhelming pictorial strength, radiant with joy and full of passion for everything that exists.

“Passion” is a very correct way to describe Olena’s work and way of life. Everything she does – she does with passion. And the most evident proof of her passionate nature is her passion for colour. Colour is the hero of all her works which sometimes results in almost abstract expressiveness. It is real like a living substance. Out of it she easily creates her universes full of peace and bliss. And when she is in mood for painting she does it with verve working day and night almost without sleep or rest.

Along with Olena’s passion for painting comes her urge to travel in pursuit of new visual impressions and experiences. Her southern soul prefers southern countries and landscapes. Spain, Italy and Greece with their blazing sun and floral exuberance are her favourite places and thus become the subject of her painting. She doesn’t paint magnificent views but concentrates on small fragments of southern landscapes and human dwelling which creates a very cosy and friendly world. What comes out is an idyllic vision of the South as a place of peace and happiness.

Another favourite subject of Olena’s paintings is floral motives. Flowers may be painted in a realistic manner that resembles impressionists’ style or be utterly stylized in order to turn them into highly decorative, almost abstract pictures. But the common feature for all her floral compositions is their pictorial strength – the prime cause of their coming into being is to provoke our sight, to make us stop thinking and start seeing. They have something in common with the objects for meditation – “floral mandalas” may be their definition.

This specific “mandala” theme seems to entertain the artist more and more. Recently Olena has discovered a new subject for her artistic investigations which is not only pictorially fascinating but also extremely poetic. “I like to contemplate shadows on the grass”, - says the artist and this way furthers her advance into the abstract. That rich pictorial material which provides the motive of a shadow for such an artist as Olena Onufriv is beyond any comparison. It seems an ideal subject for her pictorial gift. Her shadows are as colourful as her flowers but much more delicate, tender – they are shimmering and transparent, iridescent like a butterfly’s wing. They seem to embody the idea of fragility and stealing beauty of this world and are full of sublime poesy. When contemplated they are able to evoke a multitude of the most poetical and sensual associations – a light breeze brushing through the grasses, a sigh of bliss, an afternoon idleness, preciousness of every tiny moment…

Contemporary art is a rather dangerous thing – it possesses the ability to unmask most intimate desires, thoughts and attitudes of its creator though he or she may stay unaware of it. But what Olena Onufriv’s art reveals to the world is an utterly feminine attitude – keen on nature and natural, life and living and possessing the quality of divine innocence that accepts life as blessing. Her painting is a passionate message to the Big World from an intimate artistic paradise.