The exhibition "Untold Stories" presents the graphic works of Mariupol artist Pavlo Ponomarenko, who temporarily lives in Lviv.
    Pavlo Mykolayovych Ponomarenko was born on May 1, 1979 in the city of Mariupol, Donetsk region. He graduated from the Kharkiv National University of Radio Electronics with a degree in "computer networks and systems", received a diploma in computer systems analysis (2005). He worked at the metallurgical plant "Azovstal" in the city of Mariupol, Donetsk region.
    With the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, he was forced to leave his hometown together with his wife and three children in mid-March 2022. Currently lives in Lviv.
    He was fond of drawing since childhood, but he had no dream of becoming an artist. However, he studied the works of outstanding masters and their painting techniques with interest. Not having a professional art education, since 2011 he has been seriously engaged in visual arts. Works in the genre of cubism, abstract art. In his works, he offers a vision of the surrounding world through the analysis of geometric shapes, and signs them briefly: "PO".
    Member of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine since 2017.
Participant of all-Ukrainian and international art exhibitions. He presented his first personal exhibition in Mariupol in 2021. Many of his creative works remained there and their further fate is unknown to him.
    But the artist continues to paint. In July 2022, his personal exhibition "Reflections" was held in the "HotArtHall" gallery in Lviv as part of the "Ukraine after 24.02" project, at which he presented a series of graphic and pictorial works in the style of cubism, most of them in black and white tones - on contrasts, with a lot of sharp corners. "This exhibition is a reflection on the events that happened to me and my family. Paintings are emotions, images of my inner state, and I don't see any positive picture here. For me, war is a tragedy that can happen unexpectedly to every person," the artist said at the opening of the exhibition. And the famous Lviv art critic and cultural expert Marko Simkin, who met the artist at one of the charity auctions where paintings were sold for the benefit of children who became disabled and became refugees due to the war, and to whom Pavlo Ponomarenko, after experiencing his own tragedy, gave his painting, noted during the presentation: "Ponomarenko's works are a new stage in the development of cubism in Ukraine. The artist does not copy Picasso, who was the founder of cubism, nor Malevich, Yermilov, or Khvostenko-Khvostov. Pavlo has his own recognizable style. This exhibition shows the indomitable spirit of the Ukrainian nation. This is very important today and it is a colossal breakthrough for our Ukrainian art. Now it is opening in a new way and the whole world will know about Ukraine because of these tragic events."
    Personal exhibitions of the artist were presented in the city of Rivne (2022) and Shostka, Sumy region. (2023), where the artist participated in the ArtShurf: North of Ukraine art residency in January of this year, as well as in the city of Nova Zagora, Bulgaria (2023).
    Pavlo Ponomarenko was suggested by his colleague, the famous Kropyvnytskyi artist Olha Krasnopolska, to hold an exhibition in the Oleksandr Osmerkin Art Memorial Museum. By the way, he already came to Kropyvnytskyi in September 2016 for the opening of the exhibition "Heirs of Kuindzhi" on the occasion of the 175th anniversary of the birth of Mariupol native painter and teacher Arkhyp Kuindzhi from the private collection of Mariupol collector Oleksandr Chernov in the gallery "Yelysavethrad", the owner of which Mykola Tsukanov is a laureate of the Oleksandr Osmerkin regional prize in the field of fine arts and art history in the nomination "art history and art history" (2016). At the same time, the artist and collector were invited to the television program "Morning Coffee" of the Kirovohrad regional television and radio company, where they enthusiastically talked about the artistic life of the city on the coast of the Sea of Azov.
    Forty-one graphic sheets by Pavlo Ponomarenko are presented in the exposition of the exhibition "Untold Stories". The works were made with acrylic and gouache paints in the author's style in 2022-2023 in Lviv. Thoughts, emotions, feelings, worldview, philosophical reflections on human existence in the realities of war, longing for the sea and a peaceful life, hope and confidence that prudence and the creation of life will defeat the dark beast - all this is reflected by the artist in his favorite cubic forms with open local colors . Special attention is drawn to the artist's self-portraits - "Sad Self-Portrait" of 2022, "Self-Portrait" and "Selfie" of 2023. It is in them that the entire spectrum of metamorphoses of a creative personality is reproduced, from despair and deep pain to emotional and psychological recovery despite all the tragedies experienced and the loss of relatives, because art heals a wounded soul and instills in it faith in life. In one of the interviews, when a journalist asked what the world should be like after the war, Pavlo Ponomarenko answered affirmatively without thinking that it should be love.
    The author's commentary on the exhibition, sent by Pavlo Ponomarenko in an e-mail to the curator of the exhibition Olha Krasnopolska, is also impressive with its frankness: "UNTOLD STORIES. Emotions. With the help of this exhibition, I offer to feel the emotions that, I am sure, many residents of Mariupol felt. Conventionally, the exhibition can be divided into two parts - black and white and color. You can say that this exhibition reflects my state in one or another period of time, judging by the colors - the black and white works are from last year, in the fall of the 22nd I already started to do something in color: the reflected events with my family, city and state spilled into black white works with the addition of red. But among them there are also positive black and white works - these are Lviv trams. In general, this is a separate topic, but these works, in my opinion, are very positive. But nothing lasts forever, so I allowed myself to experiment again with the form with the help of colors. The works are completely different in appearance, but they have one common feature - each of them tells something. These are the stories that happened here in Lviv with me and my entourage. The artist is influenced by many things - news, surrounding people, the general situation. Therefore, the art that I know is purely subjective. But still, I suggest that you immerse yourself in the exhibition and feel the emotions that I felt when I made these works: sadness, longing, gaiety, joy and overall positivity. I will finish writing on this and offer to see the exhibition. All works are for sale. Thank you. Sincerely, Pavlo Po. 19.08.2023"