Come meet Kevin on January 26, 2012, Thursday Night ArtWalk, 7-9 pm

This 2011 Oil Painters of American Gold Medalist will be exhibiting 10+ new paintings.

Regina will be painting at Gallery Russia during the Opening Night Reception:

Thursday, ArtWalk, Feb. 16, 2012,  7-9 pm

To see the works, click on Chuikov′s name found under ″Soviet Art (A - F)″ on the left menu.

Gallery Russia has released new paintings by Soviet Era master Evgeni Chuikov (1924 - 2000) for the first time in several years.

Not often does a painter discover his unique philosophy, style or mission early in his career. More often, even talented painters develop and struggle over many years before they have a major breakthrough in their painting. Evgeni Chuikov was fortunate in that he seemingly discovered his ″lyrical impressionist″ style from the very beginning. Much credit must be given to his mentor and lifelong friend and fellow painter, Georgi Kolosovski. Kolosovski had much to do with pioneering this lyrical style in and around Zaprozhe, Ukraine where both artists spent the majority of their professional careers.

One must equally remember the time period and place in which Chuikov was forging ahead with his impressionist work. While it sounds somewhat cliche now to say that a painter faced great hurdles in the Soviet Union in painting ″unofficial″ art, it was the truth. Chuikov was an unabashed fan of Western painting styles such as French Impressionism, the American landscape and Scottish colorists. To have admitted such an influence was at times dangerous enough; but, to consistently paint in a style remniscent of such schools in the Soviet Period was innovative and daring. To have managed to be celebrated as a fine painter, an Honored Artist of Ukraine, an eventual Peoples′ Artist of Ukraine and a longtime President of the Zaporozhe Artists′ Union bears great testament to the skill and vision of this painter. It is one of the reasons that Chuikov′s paintngs are actively sought by Ukrainian collectors today as an important artist from the Soviet Period.

Chuikov′s philosophy can be easily seen in one of his quotes that reads: ″Do not paint a tree, a lake or anything else--paint the atmosphere. In the tree there exists the sky, in the sky there exists the tree, in the lake their exists the sky. Their unity is what the artist must show--unity which is fluid and ever-changing.″

We hope you enjoy seeing new works by this wonderful painter and visionary.

Gallery Russia is pleased to present a handful of new works by two of our more accomplished contemporary painters-Alexander Kremer and Valery Shmatko. To see the full images, look under the artists' names in Contemporary Artists.