Pymonenko, Mykola

Pymonenko, Mykola, b 9 March 1862 in Priorka (a suburb of Kyiv), d 26 March 1912 in Kyiv. (Photo: Mykola Pymonenko.) Prominent Ukrainian realist painter; son-in-law of Volodymyr Orlovsky; full member of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Arts from 1904. After studying at the Kyiv Drawing School (1878–82) and the Saint Petersburg Academy of Arts (1882–4) he taught at the Kyiv Drawing School (1884–1900) and Kyiv Art School (1900–6). He took part in the exhibitions of the Society of South Russian Artists (1891–6) and Peredvizhniki society (from 1893) and became a member of the latter society in 1899. In 1909 he was elected a member of the Paris International Association of Arts and Literatures. Pymonenko produced over 700 genre scenes, landscapes, and portraits, many of which were reproduced as postcards. They include Wedding (The Kyiv Gubernia) (1891), Girls Fortune-telling (1893), Kyiv Flower Seller (1897), At the Market (1898), Victim of Fanaticism (1899), Before the Storm (1906), Hay Gathering in Ukraine (1907), Meeting a Compatriot (1908), Young People (At the Well) (1909), Hopak (1908; bought by the Louvre), and Paschal Matins (1910). Pymonenko also created illustrations for several of Taras Shevchenko's narrative poems, and in the 1890s he took part in painting the murals in Saint Volodymyr's Cathedral in Kyiv. Books about him have been written by Yakiv Zatenatsky (1955) and P. Hovdia (1957), and an album of his works was published in Kyiv in 1983.