“Give me a thousand years, and I will paint the sky...”
IVAN MARCHUK
People’s Artist of Ukraine (1996), laureate of the Taras Shevchenko National Prize of Ukraine (1997), knight of the Order of Freedom, recipient of the presidential National Legend of Ukraine award (2021). Listed in The Daily Telegraph’s Top 100 Living Geniuses of 2007.
Biography
Ivan Marchuk was born on May 12, 1936 in the village Moskalivka of the Ternopil region of Ukraine (at the time Volhynian Voivodeship of the Polish Republic) into a poor peasant family. Ivan Marchuk's father was a well-known weaver throughout the district. Ivan had three sisters. He started drawing as a child.
“There are few pictures that I painted with my head, my mind. They just seem to come to me. It's as if you unwind a ball of visions, and gradually a picture emerges"
Despite the lack of materials, he created art with natural pigments from flower petals, grass and fruits. After seven years of primary school, he studied decorative painting at the Ivan Trush Lviv School of Applied Arts from 1951 to 1956. Marchuk described this period as transformative, thanks to progressive teachers who inspired him to study outside the ideologically safe space of socialist realism. In 1959 he joined an underground group led by one of his teachers, who introduced its members to unauthorized art, history, music, literature and religion. After completing mandatory service in the Soviet army, Marchuk went on to study ceramics at the Lviv Institute of Applied Arts, graduating in 1965. To make money, Marchuk also worked at an organization that made billboards and posters for factories, clubs and theaters. He then moved to Kyiv. From 1965 to 1968 Ivan Marchuk worked at the Institute for Superhard Materials of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.
From 1968 to 1984 Marchuk made illustrations for Soviet publications at the Kyiv Factory of Monumental and Decorative Art. During this time, experimenting with different artistic forms in search of his own creative method and path in art, he started to create the polystylistic and polythematic series of works “Voice of My Soul”, which will branch off into new series throughout his career.
This period of his life is also when the KGB began to persecute him for his non-conformist leanings, with the repression reaching a peak in the 1970s. The Soviet authorities were particularly concerned with Marchuk’s use of dark colors, which, in their opinion, did not correspond to the typical bright images of socialist realism. In addition to accusations of deviating from socialist realism, the KGB suspected Marchuk of supporting Ukrainian nationalism because he came from Lviv, spoke Ukrainian and painted Ukrainian public figures. Denied membership in the Union of Artists of the USSR, he was unable to participate in exhibitions and sell his works. Marchuk's first exhibition in Kyiv wasn’t until 1980. After he was fired from the Kyiv Factory of Monumental and Decorative Art, the artist began a long period of life abroad. He traveled to Australia in 1988, spent a year in Canada, and lived in the US from 1990 to 2001, where he continued to create paintings.
After the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the US, Marchuk decided to return to Ukraine. Due to the full-scale war started by the Russian Federation in Ukraine in 2022, the artist was forced to leave Ukraine once again and currently resides in the Austrian capital of Vienna. He continues to draw, creating new and supplementing existing series of paintings. Ivan Marchuk's friends and local Ukrainian community in Vienna support the artist by creating the opportunities to exhibit his works for the people to enjoy, which has always been the biggest aspiration of the artist. The exhibition "Love Your Ukraine" was followed by the exhibition "Familiar Unfamiliar" at the National Museum Kyiv Picture Gallery in Kyiv in 2023, and in 2024, the exhibition "Cosmic Mystery of Life" took place at the Kyiv Museum. These exhibitions were held under the patronage of the Ukrainian President and the Ministry of Culture. His largest exhibition to date took place in February 2024 in Vienna, featuring around 250 works. At the same time, from January to March 2024, the "Viennese Rhapsodies" cycle, created in Vienna, was exhibited, reflecting a deep connection with Viennese culture. From December 2024 to the end of March 2025, a retrospective exhibition featuring around forty paintings from fifteen different cycles was held at the National Maritime and Shipping Museum in Gdańsk. In February 2025, approximately 60 of his paintings were showcased in a solo exhibition in the Vatican. On this occasion, Pope Francis greeted Ivan Marchuk during private audience.
At the beginning of 2025, the non-profit Ivan Marchuk Foundation was established in Vienna. Its purpose is to preserve the artist’s heritage and continue making it accessible to the public through exhibitions.
Artistry
The range of artistic styles passed through the prism of Marchuk’s unique worldview and transferred onto canvas is phenomenally wide - from primitivism (with clear archetypal features) to realism, hyperrealism, abstractionism, abstract expressionism, surrealism and abstract surrealism. By manipulating proportions, rhythm and color, Marchuk creates subconsciously and influences the subconscious.
Marchuk invented an original technique called “plyontanism” (from the Ukrainian word "plyontaty" - to weave, intertwine, thread) in which paint is applied in thin colored lines that intertwine at different angles, creating the effect of volume and luminescence. Marchuk's style, bordering on man and machine made due to its intricacy and labor intensity, is practically impossible to recreate. He first used this technique in a landscape painting in 1972. Plyontanism became the artist’s signature style – an original way to transfer his perception of the world onto canvas characterized by deformation of images, asymmetry of color and rhythmic contractions of brushstrokes.
Ivan Marchuk has organized his paintings into fifteen series "Voice of My Soul", "Landscape", "Blooming", "Shevchenkiana", "Color Preludes", "Portrait", "Still Life", "New Expressions", "White Planet I", "White Planet II", "Dreams Flooding", "Looking into Infinity", "White and Black. Dialogue", "Blind cycle", "Vienna Rhapsodies".
Throughout his more than 60-year-long career, Ivan Marchuk has held nearly 200 solo and collective exhibitions on 5 continents of the world, and "woven" hundreds of thousands of color and monochromatic kilometers of extraordinary plyontanism in thousands of artistic masterpieces, thus demonstrating the incredible human potential to create art.
The philosophical themes of his paintings convey the dramatic tension experienced by humanity and resonate with the challenges of the modern age. Using art, Marchuk has constructed his personal vision of the world, rooted in high aesthetics and focused on the future, and has offered his own vision of deep philosophical themes of human existence. His works play a powerful role in cultural diplomacy, helping to shape a positive image of Ukraine on the world stage.
Honors and Awards
1997 – Awarded the Taras Shevchenko National Prize of Ukraine
October 2007 – Included in The Daily Telegraph’s list of Top 100 Living Geniuses
June 2016 – Awarded the Order of Freedom in Ukraine
August 2021 – Presented the National Legend of Ukraine Award by the President of Ukraine
From 17 to 26 October 2025, the Stadtgalerie Rathaus, Salzburg will host an exhibition of the renowned Ukrainian artist Ivan Marchuk titled “The Voice of My Soul”.The opening will take place on 16 October at 6:00 pm. Welcome addresses will be given by Gabriele Venditto-Wagner, Salzburg City Councillor, and Beatrice Bleibler from the Salzburg City Galleries. The introduction will be delivered by Ivan Machynskyi, Chairman of the Ukrainian Centre Salzburg.Ivan Marchuk is one of the most distinguished figures of contemporary Ukrainian art. He was awarded the title “National Legend of Ukraine” and has been listed by the British newspaper “The Daily Telegraph” among the “100 Living Geniuses”. With his unique technique “Pliontanism”, he creates works where the finest lines in multiple shades generate striking depth and luminosity.The Salzburg exhibition will showcase around 50 works from six creative cycles, including the series “The Voice of My Soul” and “Look into Infinity”, as well as hyperrealistic Ukrainian landscapes. The artworks are provided by the Ivan Marchuk Non-profit Private Foundation.Organised in cooperation with the Ukrainian Centre Salzburg, the exhibition will feature the personal presence of Ivan Marchuk at the opening, accompanied by Ukrainian musicians who will enrich the evening’s atmosphere.Venue: Stadtgalerie Rathaus, Säulenhalle im Rathaus, 1st floor, Kranzlmarkt 1, 5020 SalzburgOpening hours: 8:00–18:00
02.10.2025
On August 4, 2025, a major exhibition by Ivan Marchuk titled "Awakening" opened at the Museum of the History of the City of Kyiv. The event is dedicated to Ukraine's Independence Day and will run until November 9.This is a joint project of the Museum of the History of the City of Kyiv and the Ivan Marchuk Museum and Cultural Center of Contemporary Art. The new exhibition features more than 100 works by the master from different periods of his creative career — from museum collections and private collections.The core of the exhibition comprises three iconic series by the artist:🔹 "The Voice of My Soul" — deeply philosophical images filled with inner light;🔹 "Landscape" — a poetic vision of Ukrainian nature, a longing for what has been lost;🔹 "Blossoming" — an ode to life, beauty growing through time and space.Each series is displayed in its own exhibition zone with unique design, allowing visitors to fully immerse themselves in the artist’s world and experience the power of art that inspires and awakens.At the center of the exhibition is the iconic painting "Awakening" (1992) — created by Ivan Marchuk in New York amid the emotional struggles of emigration and hope for Ukraine's independence. Although the work has long since become a classic, it still resonates today as a personal declaration by the artist — a message about the inevitable triumph of light over darkness, the immortality of the Ukrainian nation, and its struggle for life and freedom."This exhibition is about the light we seek within ourselves, about the moment when the soul awakens. 'Awakening' became a very personal image for me: a longing for Ukraine, a hope of return, the light I carried within me, despite everything," the artist shares.The project brings together 9 leading museums of Ukraine and 18 private collectors, making it possible for visitors to see not only well-known works but also those never before exhibited.The exhibition is open from August 6 until November 9th at the following address:Museum and Exhibition Center of the Museum of the History of the City of Kyiv7 Bohdana Khmelnytskoho St.Opening hours:Wednesday–Sunday: 12:00–19:00Monday–Tuesday: ClosedTicket office: until 18:30Ticket prices:Full — 200 UAHReduced — 100 UAH
07.08.2025
Ivan Marchuk is one of the most significant figures in the contemporary Ukrainian art scene. Since the beginning of the war, he has been living and working in Vienna. Under the title "Tell Me the Truth", his most famous works will be on display from May 2 to May 12, 2025, in his largest solo exhibition to date, featuring an immersive experience at the Aula der Wissenschaften. The exhibition is also a commemoration of the establishment of the Ivan Marchuk non-profit foundation at the beginning of 2025. Its goal is to preserve the artist's cultural heritage and ensure its accessibility to the public through exhibitions."Tell Me the Truth" will showcase around 400 of his most well-known works from various creative periods across two floors, some in an immersive format. Paintings will come to life on massive walls, alternating in a captivating rhythmic and musical presentation. This exhibition offers a comprehensive overview of the life’s work of this extraordinary artist and free thinker. Over his nearly 70-year artistic career, Marchuk has created around 5,000 works and held over 200 solo exhibitions across five continents.Exhibition Opening: "Tell Me the Truth" with Immersive Experience📅 Vernissage- May 2, 2025, 17:00 🕙 Opening Hours: May 3–12, 2025, daily from 10:00 to 19:00📍 Aula der Wissenschaften, Wollzeile 27A, 1010 Vienna 🎟 Free Admission
20.03.2025