Sorokhtei, Osyp

Sorokhtei, Osyp [Сорохтей, Осип; Soroxtej], b 28 February 1890 in Baranchychi, Sambir county, Galicia, d 27 November 1941 in Stanyslaviv, Galicia. Painter and graphic artist. He studied at the Cracow Academy of Arts (1911–14, 1919–20) and taught drawing at the Ukrainian gymnasiums in Stanyslaviv (1920–6, 1929–39) and Sniatyn (1926–9). Sorokhtei worked mostly in pencil, pen, and watercolor. He drew expressionistic portraits of Taras Shevchenko (1922), Ivan Kotliarevsky (1922), Yevhen Hrebinka, and Modest Menzinsky and 50 drawings on biblical themes and 42 on Christ’s Passion; painted Subcarpathian landscapes and genre scenes, religious paintings, and still lifes; did caricatures of Ukrainian Sich Riflemen, public figures, church leaders, and intellectuals; and illustrated Antin Lototsky’s Zhyttia i pryhody Tsiapky Skoropada (The Life and Adventures of Tsiapka Skoropad, 1926). He took part in exhibitions organized by the Circle of Contributors to Ukrainian Art and the Association of Independent Ukrainian Artists in Lviv and in two international shows of graphic art in Warsaw (1931). Retrospective exhibitions of his works were held in Stanyslaviv (1942) and Lviv (1970).

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 5 (1993).]