“Ukraine in my pictures is painted in red and orange colors. Like a lit candle”

Mykhailo Demtsiu is 62. He looks very young. I pay attention to his bright shirt, it is as bright as his canvases, mainly landscapes and still lifes, from which it is impossible to take your eyes away. I ask about his resemblance to Salvador Dali. The master admits, “Dali’s artwork is not very close to me, but I like his image.” He says that his resemblance to Dali is 20 years back. He recalls a funny incident in Dali Museum in Figueras, where the visitors took Demtsiu for a specially dressed and taught person who imitates Dali.

Mykhailo Demtsiu comes from Sambir. He graduated from the Ivan Trush School and says that it is good that he did not study at the academy (at that time the Institute of Decorative and Applied Art), “I saw people who came under influence there.” He speaks kindly of his teachers Taras Drahan and Mykola Burdun, “who taught me to draw well without imposing their style and opinion.”

People describe Demtsiu as a light artist, in spite of the fact that for the most part he creates his canvases with the help of thick strokes made by a palette knife, not a brush. His “rough” pictures and tender watercolor paintings are pierced with warmth and positive emotions. And he is just like that: bright and positive. He has a very clear understanding of his Ukrainianness, which equals to talent and high feeling of his own dignity.

You are often called a purely Lviv artist. What is your attitude to these words?

“I perceive them as a compliment. But I think that it does not refer to my creative work, rather it is a connection with the place of residence. Like those brothers in hats who conduct tours [Petro and Ivan Radkovets. – Author] and seem to be a traditional part of the Lviv interior. As for my paintings, in Kyiv they ascribe me to both Transcarpathian and Lviv schools, they cannot make up their mind. In the same way they say that I’m a Lemko, a Hutsul, and I consider myself a Boiko. But I don’t argue. Let it be as it is. But when I’m abroad, I’m a Ukrainian.”

Is there an artist whom you consider the icon of style?

“From the very beginning I loved the society and expressive artists. I am speaking about the French and German expressionists. But now when I paint, I open only my catalogues, I have six of them. I mean I take my own pictures as the groundwork. I have exhibited my paintings in France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. But Spain is the place where I love to paint the most. Not in the stuffy cities, but where there is space and air.”

They say you are a person of a mood and inspiration, meaning that you don’t work at a canvas for long.

“Yes. I don’t like to think too long, because if I do so, nothing comes out of it. It is important for me to come up to the canvas and reproduce this moment of mood. Art is an accident on the level of subconscious.”

A HUTSUL WITH A PIPE

Your paintings have a very rich color palette. Do you prefer some specific colors?

“I have made up my mind regarding the countries. Ukraine is painted in my pictures in red and orange. Like a lit candle. France is blue. Spain in color is the closest to our country. Germany is ochre-golden-black. These are complicated deep colors. But on the whole the color of Germany is beautiful.”

I think all colors in your pictures are optimistic.

“The artist must show that not everything is so bad. Especially now. The enemy should see that he cannot break us: we must have music and fine art in this period of time.”

What is your optimism based on?

“On tomorrow’s day. I think in the following way: no matter what I do today, tomorrow it must be better.”

Creative people sometimes say that they love all of their works, because these works are their children.

“As a rule, when I paint, I dislike many things. Sometimes I dislike them so much that I paint the picture anew.”

How often?

“One out of five. But artists often underestimate themselves. Ten or twenty years pass, and you understand that the work is good. Why is this so? Because many years later you look at your work as at someone else’s creation. Even if something is not finished, this is actually art.”

Today many artists emigrate. Having worked in different countries of the world, you haven’t changed your citizenship? Why?

“Because I have talked with those who left. They, top-level masters, are not respected worthily. So, it is important to come back in time.”

COMMENTARY

Natalia KOSMOLINSKA, art historian:

“Today it is hard to imagine that the artist started his professional way with delicate watercolor technique. Demtsiu’s vital power is so strong that the stormy emotions of his paintings are overflowing the frames. In the viscous mirage of his landscapes the water acquires the consistency of melted metal, whereas the thick sun fuses with the earth that is soft as warm butter into a whole scorching substance. One of the ‘fathers’ of this ‘protuberance’ colors of Mykhailo Demtsiu is, without doubt, the art of his native Hutsulshchyna. The many colors of the icons painted on the glass, the richly decorated jars and tiles, carved kitchen utensils, richly embroidered clothes and decorated weapons – this flourishing of ethnography and demonology of the Hutsul world have provoked many generations of artists: Lesia Ukrainka created The Forest Song, Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky – The Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, the great magician of the 20th century cinema, Serhii Parajanov – a masterpiece screening of this work. However, for Mykhailo Demtsiu the multicolored Hutsul heritage was not enough, so he added the rich sunny facture of Transcarpathian school. The result turned out to be so phenomenal that the artist was noticed not only in his homeland, but also in Europe, which is satiated with chocking experiments. Although the national themes do not prevail in the creative work of the artist, the genetics of his painting, in spite of the topic, remains a Ukrainian one, generous for emotion, color, and exuberance of being.”