Stepan Koropchak

Stepan Koropchak was a distinguished Ukrainian painter, graphic artist, and educator, whose work became a significant chapter in the history of the Lviv art school of the second half of the 20th century.

Stepan Koropchak's paintings were regularly exhibited at all-Ukrainian and all-Union exhibitions beginning in the 1960s. Today his pieces are held in the National Museum in Lviv, the Lviv Gallery of Art, and the Ternopil Regional Museum of Local History, and are also in demand at Ukrainian and international art auctions and in private collections.

The artist was born in 1926 in the village of Nezabytivtsi (now the village of Uhry, Lviv Oblast). He participated in the German-Soviet War.

In 1953, he graduated from the Lviv Institute of Decorative and Applied Arts. During his studies, he had the opportunity to gain valuable knowledge and experience from such luminaries of art as Yosyp Bokshay, Roman Selsky, Mykola Fediuk, and Rostyslav Sylvestrov.

For many years he shared his experience with younger generations. After graduating, he worked in Lviv as a lecturer in the Department of Architecture at Lviv Polytechnic; from 1971 — at the Lviv Institute of Decorative and Applied Arts; from 1986 — as Professor of the Department of Academic Painting. He was the author of articles on art theory.

The artwork of Stepan Koropchak was featured in all-Ukrainian exhibitions from 1960 and all-Union exhibitions from 1972. Solo exhibitions were held in Lviv in 1961 (jointly with Emmanuil Mysko) and in 1984.

The artist died in 2000 in Lviv.

The artist worked in the field of easel painting and graphic art. The principal themes of his work were Carpathian and Crimean landscapes, the urban architecture of Lviv, genre scenes from the lives of peasants and Hutsuls, portraits of craftsmen and prominent figures, and still lifes.

Among Stepan Koropchak’s original paintings are Carpathian Landscape (1956), Fortress in Sudak (1962), Crimean Landscape (1966), Echo of the Carpathians (1968), Evening in Crimea (1975), and many others.

UFDA digitized A Young Man from Kryvorivnia (1974) by the artist from the collection of the Regional Communal Museum of Local History in Borshchiv. This painting is now available for viewing on the fund's website.

The artist developed his own individual, distinctly expressed style with a noticeable influence of Impressionism, characterized by particular attention to light, color, and the emotional state of nature. 

A student of such luminaries as Roman Selsky and Yosyp Bokshay, he succeeded in combining in his style the finest traditions of western Ukrainian painting with the refined colorism of Impressionism. 

Koropchak immortalized in his canvases the distinctive beauty of the Carpathians, the architecture of Lviv, and the vivid imagery of his fellow countrymen.