The Cossack in the Steppe

Serhii Vasylkivskyi was a master of lyrical-epic landscapes, genre scenes, and works on themes of Ukrainian history.

The artist left a valuable legacy for Ukrainian art—nearly 3,000 works, of which he donated 1,500 to the Kharkiv Art Museum in his final days. Unfortunately, many of Serhii Vasylkivskyi's paintings were lost or taken from Ukraine during World War II, and today, around 500 of his works are preserved in museums and private collections

The artist was born in 1854, in Izium, Kharkiv Governorate. In 1861, Serhii's parents moved to Kharkiv, where he first developed his artistic skills at the Kharkiv Gymnasium. After five years at the gymnasium, at his father's insistence, Vasylkivskyi enrolled in the Kharkiv Veterinary School. However, in 1873, financial hardship forced him to leave, and he worked for a time as an office clerk.

From 1876 to 1885, he studied in the landscape class at the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts under Mykhailo Clodt and Volodymyr Orlovsky. Having completed his studies by 1883, young Serhii frequently traveled around Ukraine, creating a series of renowned landscapes. In March 1886, he went abroad, living in France and traveling through England, Spain, Italy, South Africa, and Germany, where he studied art museum collections. The artist worked extensively. Notably, Serhii Vasylkivskyi's art was exhibited at the Paris Salon.

Highly valuing creative independence, Vasylkivskyi avoided membership in any single association and presented his works at exhibitions by various societies in St. Petersburg, Kharkiv, and Kyiv. In 1900, he organized his first solo exhibition in Kharkiv, showcasing 120 works.

The artist passed away in 1917, in Kharkiv. After his death, his works are held in various institutions in Ukraine and internationally, including the Nykanor Onatskyi Regional Art Museum in Sumy. 

Striving for the national essence in his subject matter and the narrative quality of his painterly language, the artist did not simplify but instead deepened the structure of his imagery. The central theme of his landscape art was always the image of Ukraine. Among Serhii Vasylkivskyi's original paintings are "The Cossack in the Steppe" (1890s), "Returning from the Pasture" (1890s), "The Gift" (1910), "The Church in Galicia" (1913), and "The Village Street" (1890-1900s). 

The artist also created a renowned portrait of Taras Shevchenko, depicting the poet in full length, seated against a backdrop of a distant, expansive steppe panorama with a low horizon and a vast sky. Serhii Vasylkivskyi's paintings for sale are available at auction on the UFDA website. 

Serhii Vasylkivskyi is often called a poet of Ukrainian painting for the exceptional lyricism in his landscapes and historical works. 

His time abroad solidified his resolve to focus on landscape art in Ukrainian painting. Vasylkivskyi traveled on foot through the Kharkiv and Poltava regions and journeyed down the Dnipro River to Zaporizhzhia. He was inspired by these places and painted Ukrainian primeval forests, meadows, village houses, and streets in different seasons, often incorporating simple genre motifs that harmoniously blended with the landscape.

Avoiding simplification, he deepened the tonal spatiality and structure of the depiction. In the artwork of Serhii Vasylkivskyi, lyrical digressions and historical landscapes on Cossack themes, which conveyed the spirit of past eras, are woven into the fabric of contemporary images of the Ukrainian land.