Exhibition of the graphic works by Ukrainian artists of the 1960s – 1970s “Rise of Ukrainian Spirituality” to Ukraine Independence Day was organized within events of the 100th anniversary of the Ukrainian Revolution of 1917-1921 and the 205th anniversary of Taras Shevchenko.
    The exposition of the exhibition consists of 13 graphic works on Shevchenko theme by famous artists of Ukrainian easel graphic work from the museum collection “Modern Ukrainian Fine Art”.
    Prominent Ukrainian graphic artists - People’s Artist of the USSR Mykhailo Derehus (1904-1997), Merited Art Worker of Ukrainian SSR and People’s Artist of Ukrainian SSR Oleksandr Danchenko (1926-1993), Merited Cultural Worker of Ukraine and People’s Artist of Ukraine Volodymyr Kutkin (1926-2003), People’s Artist of Ukraine Mykola Popov (1927-2010), a member of the Union of Artist of the USSR and a member of Los Angeles Art Association (the USA) Samuil Kaplan (born 1928), a member of the Union of Artists of the USSR Vasyl Avramenko (born 1936), members of the Union of Artists of the USSR and the National Union of Artists of Ukraine Hennadii Polovyi (1927-2017), Yurii Lohvyn (1939-2019), Anatolii Navrotskyi (1934-2003) present the pages from life and creative work of Taras Shevchenko in illustrations of his works and landscape motifs of the places that inspired the genius of Ukrainian people. The original graphic art images became the classics of Shevchenkiana because the majority of the artists worked on the jubilee edition of “Kobzar” (1964) to the 150th anniversary of the poet.
    The exhibited works are made in classic graphic techniques – etching, graving, woodblock printing, lithography, aquatint, and linocut. They got to the museum collection in 2005 after the exhibition “From the Artist’s Studio” from a unique private collection of a doctor and war veteran Anatolii Chumachenko (1923-2013), who has been living in the town for many years, worked in the Regional Sanitary and Epidemiological Station, was a high-achiever of Health Care of the USSR. The history of the collection creation is rather interesting. During his studies in Kyiv Medical Institute named after O.O.Bohomolets, Anatolii Chumachenko got acquainted with the nephew of his wife – a graphic artist Anatolii Narotskyi (1934-2003), who graduated from Kyiv State Art Institute, was an art editor of the publishing house “Veselka”. Anatolii Chumachenko visited the artist’s studio, where young artists met and communicated with them because he was interested in the history of Ukrainian visual arts; and the artists presented him with his graphic works that turned into the collection with time. The collection is peculiar for the demonstration of technical samples of graphic skills and discovering nearly all the genres of Ukrainian graphic art of the 1960s – the beginning of the 1970s.
    The artists whose works are presented at the exhibition have no less outstanding biographies. Almost all of them graduated from Kyiv State Art Institute (now the National Academy of Fine Art and Architecture), studios of famous graphic artists – People’s Artist of the USSR Vasyl Kasiian and People’s Artist of Ukrainian SSR Oleksandr Pashchenko. Many of them went through Stalin’s labor camps for their patriotic views. Hennadii Polovyi (1927-2017), whose work is at the poster of the exhibition, in 1950 together with his brother, composer Valerii Polovyi, were repressed in accusation of forming a youth anti-Soviet organization “The People’s Liberation Party”. They served their sentence for 4 years in “Usollah” in Solikamsk. In 1954, he was exonerated due to the absence of the legal components of the crime. Later, he wrote numerous memoir-articles about the artists, members of the Sixtiers. People’s Artists of Ukraine Volodymyr Kutkin (1926-2003) also was arrested and sentenced for 8 years in prison for Ukrainian nationalism during his studies in the institute in 1950. In 5 years he was set free on parole and exonerated due to the absence of the legal components of the crime. And in 1959, he graduated from the Department of Graphic Art of the Art Institute. Ukrainian graphic artist and writer Yurii Lohvyn (1939-2019) is closely related to our steppe land because his father – a famous art historian and architect Hryhorii Lohvyn was born in the village of Kosivka, Oleksandriia district, Kirovohrad region. Yurii Lohvyn is the author of 20 books and one of the first series of general Ukrainian stamps – “Ethnographic stories “Ancient Ukraine”, “Hetmany of Ukraine”, and “History of the army in Ukraine”. For many years, he has been the author and host of art and cultural-educational programs on Ukrainian radio.
    Each artist, whose graphic works are exhibited, is a unique creative personality, and their art was influenced by social and political processes of the so-called Khrushchev thaw and then classified as the Sixtiers movement, and later as Romantic or Silent Realism. The time of the Sixtiers Epoch absorbed hopes for renovation and bitterness of disillusions, became one of the most important milestones of Ukrainian fine art, defining the main ways of its modern development.