Rutkovych, Ivan

Rutkovych, Ivan [Руткович, Іван; Rutkovyč], b ca 1650s in Bilyi Kamin, near Zolochiv, Galicia, d ? Icon painter of the 17th century. In the 1670s he learned his craft with the painter Roman Mohylnytsky in Kamianka-Strumylova. Most of his creative life was spent in Zhovkva (1680s to ca 1708) where, among other things, he was the founder and one of the key figures in the Zhovkva School of Artists. Some of his work has been preserved, in whole or in part, such as the iconostases of the wooden churches in Volytsia Derevlianska (1680–2) and Volia Vysotska (1688–9); the large iconostasis of the Church of Christ's Nativity in Zhovkva (1697–9, now in the National Museum in Lviv), which is considered to be the finest Ukrainian iconostasis; and separate icons, such as Supplication (1683) from Potylych (now in the National Museum) and The Nativity of Virgin Mary (1683) from Vyzhliv. Rutkovych's treatment of religious subjects was realistic and almost secular in spirit. The emotive richness of his colors and the rhythm of his lines testify to the influence of contemporary European art on his style. Vira Svientsitska's book about Rutkovych was published in Kyiv in 1966.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 4 (1993).]