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Victor Sydorenko

President of NAA of Ukraine

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Victor Sydorenko

    born in 1953

Artist, educator, scientist
Position: President of NAA of Ukraine

    Academician of the NAA of Ukraine (1997)

    National Artist of Ukraine (1998)

    D. in Art History (2005)

    Professor (2002)

    Foreign member of the Academy of Arts of Uzbekistan (2011)

Victor Sidorenko was awarded the Order of Merit of the II (2009) and III degrees (2004), the Certificate of Honor of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine (2003), and the Gold Medal of the National Academy of Arts of Ukraine (2003). Winner of the International Festival "Golden Section" (1995).
Participant of national and international exhibitions. His personal exhibitions were held at the National Art Museum of Ukraine (Kyiv), Kharkiv Art Museum, State Art Gallery (Lviv), State Museum of Art named after A. Kasteev of the Republic of Kazakhstan (Almaty), KIASMA Museum of Contemporary Art (Helsinki, Finland), museums and galleries of other countries.
The artist is characterized by a deep knowledge of the state and problems of the contemporary world plastic culture, an analytical approach to the realization of significant themes of history and the present, keen observation and uninhibited compositional imagination, and great productivity. Perfectly mastering the line, the ability to build form, color, the master tirelessly experiments, looking for the latest trends in the art of the new millennium. This is evidenced by his numerous paintings.
The artist's skillfully executed cycles of works are dedicated to the image of a woman, who, in his words, like flowers, carries a cosmic secret. An artist of a wide creative range, a master of painting, still life, portrait, watercolor works, projects of contemporary art exhibitions, academician V. Sydorenko has been repeatedly awarded prestigious awards, including international ones. The most famous works: triptych "Summer", cycles "Watercolors", "Women and Flowers" (1990-1993), "Cytochronisms" (1994-1997), "Amnesia" (1995-1999); "Invasion" (1996), "Ritual Dances" (1997). The author's project "Millstones of Time", which represented Ukraine at the 50th Venice Biennale (Italy) in 2003, and the multimedia project "Authentication", presented in 2006 at the International Festival "Eastern Neighbors" in the Netherlands, were very successful.
Academician V. Sydorenko is one of the leaders of contemporary Ukrainian art. The artist's creative career began in the late Soviet era, when he used realism as a point of reference and an opportunity to reflect life more or less convincingly. Gradually, the artist moved to postmodernism, contemplating the transformation of the individual in a changing world, at the intersection of the individual and the archetypal, rigid frameworks and absolute uncertainty. The artist's path from realism to neo-avant-garde is, first of all, a tribute to the complete freedom of creativity of the last generation that grew up and worked under the totalitarian regime. Time, Memory, and History are the central ideas of Sydorenko's projects, which extrapolate the polyvariance and possibility of different interpretations in the language of visual images and constructions. Academician V. Sydorenko's creative interests include the specific realities of our time: the problems of memory, the legacy of post-totalitarian rudiments, the issue of personal identification in the increasingly complex modern world, and the prospects of a person in the new globalized model of life. In addition, the research focus of his work also concerns the past, but with an emphasized de-ideologized attitude to cultural heritage, using the possibilities of the new media arsenal.The search for one's own identity in a social collective ends in the triumph of unification - this is how the artist proposes to decipher the hybrid word in the title of the exhibition "Authentication" (2006). The author does not stop there: the mechanism that generates metaphors makes him see the prototype of mummification in a domestic haircut. This triumph of the body looks like the transformation of the torso into a plaster cast, which is used to make a plaster mannequin that finally replaces a person in society. Only this mannequin has a chance to survive and gain immortality.
In the project "Levitation" (2008-2009), the artist prefers an optical illusionist play created by a dense and viscous red color, almost purple, a space of large-format picturesque planes and installation. The full-length male figures rise into the air, losing their landmarks and coordinates, and with them - themselves.
Since then, his character has been a man from the crowd, born "in the womb" of totalitarian discourse and formed in the artist's imagination during his service in the Soviet army. Over time, the character's image has acquired a different meaning, symbolizing the pursuit of self-identification in post-totalitarian contemporary society. The author explores the mechanisms of individual adaptation to an impersonal society through the images of people in underpants levitating in their own space. Not least, this formal motif can be interpreted as a kind of visual prediction of the current military clash between two worldview paradigms: totalitarian Russian and democratic European Ukrainian.
He participated in the First Kyiv Biennial "ARSENALE" (1995), as well as in the projects "Art-Kyiv Contemporary", "Great and Majestic", and video art "Feaka". He has held numerous exhibitions in galleries: "Black Square (Miami, USA), Saatchi gallery (London, UK), Yermilov Center (Kharkiv), Bottega, Mystetskyi Arsenal and Triptych (Kyiv).
In 2007, he was co-curator of the Ukrainian project at the Venice Biennale, and in 2011 and 2013 he was a commissioner of Ukrainian projects.
Academician Sydorenko's works are kept in the National Art Museum of Ukraine, KIASMA Museum of Contemporary Art (Helsinki, Finland), the collection of Yale University, in the collections of art museums and in private collections around the world.

Selected exhibition projects

Year Zero. The idea of Light

"Year Zero. The Idea of Light" is the third and final part of Victor Sydorenko's interdisciplinary project "All Colors of the Spectrum Are White Light", which covers the artist's works in various genres - painting, photography, video art, installations and sculptures - over a period of more than 25 years. The exhibition was held from December 15, 2021 to February 12, 2022 at the M17 Contemporary Art Center (Kyiv).
"Year Zero. The Idea of Light" consists exclusively of new works and sculptures by Victor Sydorenko. They are based on experiments with optics on the theme of borderline sensations between the real and the apparent, the actual and the desired. The artist leads his Character through the territory of psychological experiments, irrational processes and reincarnations, continuing his exhausting preparation for what seems to never come - an inevitable meeting with himself. This exhibition is about humanity, which is forgotten today, about the art of communication and the ability to look at the world and others with an open mind.
Curated by Andriy Siguntsov, co-curated by Yevhenia Havrylenko, and directed by Natalia Shpytkovska.

More informationVirtual tour

Несвоєчасне

«Несвоєчасне» — проєкт Віктора Сидоренка, в якому митець досліджеє теми формування індивідуальної та суспільної пам’яті, темпоральні режими культур, людської ідентичністі і того, як вона конструюється. Виставка проходила з 10 вересня по 18 листопада 2020 року в Центрі сучасного мистецтва М17 (Київ). 
Експозиція виставки складалася із двох частин: перша частина представляє роботу «Пляж і берег», яку Віктор Сидоренко писав протягом 2004-2017 років. Друга показує нові роботи серії Un-Timely, що також зображують пляжний відпочинок.
Пляж – метафора, яка може бути інтерпретована у будь-який спосіб. Пляж є особливим культурним явищем і, мабуть, найпростіше зчитується як метафора колективності. Але колективності якої доби? Потріскана фарба на полотнах митця натякає на давнину, «сивішу» за ХХ сторіччя. Дитяча пам’ять старшого глядача підкаже шукати цей пляж у найближчому минулому. Проте варто прибрати кракелюрний шар – і хіба ці «пляжні ритуали» не відображають сучасності? А чи стануть вони кардинально іншими століттям після нас? Віктор Сидоренко вводить глядачів у лабіринти часу, аби поставити питання про континуальність культури - про те, чи справді те «несвоєчасне», що не має яскравих маркерів конкретного часу, є неактуальним.

Більш детальноВідео про проєкт

Selected works

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From the series "Untimely"
2020, oil on canvas, 200 x 150 cm

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From the series "Year Zero. The Idea of Light"
2020, oil on canvas, 200 x 200 cm

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From the series "Acquiring Subjectivity"
2017, oil on canvas, 200 x 200 cm

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Із серії "Набуття суб'єктності"2017, полотно, олія, 200 х 200 см

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Із серії "Нульовий рік. Ідея Світла"2020, полотно, олія, 200 х 200 см

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Із циклу "Чорнозем"2021, папір, шовкографія, акварель, 50 х 50 см

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Із серії "Набуття суб'єктності"2017, полотно, олія, 200 х 200 см

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"Лексикон трансформацій 20"2020, папір, шовкографія, 40 х 40 см

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Із серії "Нульовий рік. Ідея Світла"2020, полотно, олія, 200 х 200 см

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Із серії "Набуття суб'єктності"2017, полотно, олія, 200 х 200 см

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Із циклу "Чорнозем"2021, папір, шовкографія, акварель, 50 х 50 см

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Із серії "Набуття суб'єктності"2017, полотно, олія, 200 х 200 см

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"Лексикон трансформацій 11"2020, папір, шовкографія, 40 х 40 см

Selected publications

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Visual art from avant-garde movements to the latest trends
К., 2008.

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Artistic Revelation of Kharkiv. In the collection: Contemporary art.
Edition 3. К., 2006.

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To improve theartistic process Fine Arts. 1987. №5.

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На переломі
Образотворче мистецтво. 1987. №5.

Selected interviews

Interview with NAA of Ukraine President Victor Sydorenko

About the role of contemporary artcollections during the war

"Visiting the artist": Victor Sidorenko

Міждисциплінарний проєкт «Нульовий рік. Ідея світла»

“Безмежне життя смерті” Віктора Сидоренка

"Технології травм" Віктора Сидоренка

"Несвоєчасне" Віктора Сидоренка

Віктор Сидоренко про покоління молодих

Віктор Сидоренко про свого героя

Про постколоніальність та вторинність

Biography

1953 - born December 31 in Taldy-Kurgan, Kazakhstan.

1979 - graduated from the Kharkiv Art and Industrial Institute.

1979-1985; 1989-1992 - lecturer at the Kharkiv Art and Industrial Institute.

1985-1988 - postgraduate student of creative workshops of the Academy of Arts of the USSR.

1987-1994 - Head of the Kharkiv Organization of the Union of Artists of Ukraine.

1989-1991 - a member of the USSR Parliament (from the Union of Artists of Ukraine).

1996 - academician-founder of the National Academy of Arts of Ukraine.

1997-2005 - Deputy Chairman of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine.

1997-2022 - Vice President of the National Academy of Arts of Ukraine.

2001-2022 - Director of the Institute of Contemporary Art Problems of the NAM of Ukraine.

Since July 2022 - President of the NAM of Ukraine.

Member of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine.


Biennale

2003 - "Millstones of Time", a personal project at the 50th International Exhibition of Contemporary Art in Venice. Author and curator of the project.
2007 - "Poem about the inland sea", Ukrainian project at the 52nd International Exhibition of Contemporary Art in Venice. Co-curator.
2011 - Authorized representative of the Ukrainian pavilion at the 54th Venice Biennale, curated by Oleksii Rogotchenko and Aquile Bonito Oliva.


Scientific works

● To improve the artistic process // Fine Arts. 1987. № 5.
● At the turning point // Fine art. 1988. № 2.
● Penetration into the mystery of eternity // Fine Arts. 1994. № 2.
● Venice Biennale and the Problems of Contemporary Art in Ukraine // Contemporary Art. Kyiv, 2004. Issue 1.
● Directness of perception // Monday. 2004. № 14.
● Artistic revelation of Kharkiv // Contemporary art. Kyiv, 2006. Issue 3.
● Visual art from avant-garde movements to the latest trends (Development of visual art in Ukraine in the XX-XXI centuries). Kyiv: VX[studio], 2008. 188 p.: ill.
● FIAC 08: a close look // Cursive. 2009. № 2.
● Practices of visual arts in the music of the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries / Victor Sydorenko, Asmati Chibalashvili, Polina Kharchenko, Igor Savchuk, Ruslana Bezuhla / STUDIA UBB MUSICA. 2022. Vol. LXVII, Special Iss. 1. P. 79-101.
● Interactive Sound Installation as an Implementation of Contemporary Communication Models / Victor Sydorenko, Asmati Chibalashvili, Polina kharchenko, Ruslana Bezuhla, Igor Savchuk / Postmodern Openings. 2022. Vol. 13, Iss. 2. P. 239-253.


Collections

● National Art Museum of Ukraine● Kharkiv Art Museum, Ukraine● Dnipro Art Museum, Ukraine● Zaporizhzhia Regional Art Museum, Ukraine● Mykolaiv Regional Art Museum, Ukraine● KIASMA Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki, Finland● Izmail Art Gallery, Ukraine● Ministry of Culture of Ukraine, Ukraine● Yale University, School of Art, USA● Presidential Palace, Almaty, Kazakhstan

Illustration

Location20 Bulvarno-Kudryavska street Kyiv city, 01054

Phone+38 044 486 33 69+38 044 486 2460

E-mailmoc.liamg%40aimedaca.uman


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Illustration

Location20 Bulvarno-Kudryavska street Kyiv city, 01054

Phone+38 044 486 33 69+38 044 486 2460

E-mailmoc.liamg%40aimedaca.uman


Subscribe to the newsletter of the NAA of Ukraine:

Thank you for subscribing

to our regular newsletter!

Can't send form.

Please try again later.

Developed by NS Advisory

All rights reserved