Tote Bag "Sea. Crimea. Arkhyp Kuindzhi"

Arkhyp Kuindzhi is a genius Ukrainian landscape painter who revolutionized painting with his unique mastery of light. He was born in Mariupol into the family of a poor shoemaker of Greek origin. Orphaned at the age of six, Arkhyp endured an exceptionally difficult childhood and a thorny path to an art education. However, Kuindzhi overcame all hardships, and as soon as he earned his first relatively large funds from an exhibition of his paintings in Paris, he returned to Mariupol and married the daughter of a wealthy merchant, whom he had been in love with since his youth.

Later becoming a millionaire, the artist and his family lived quite modestly, donating most of their wealth to charity and the support of young artists, especially in Mariupol. The vast majority of Kuindzhi's canvases are dedicated to his native Azov region, the Dnipro River, and Crimea.

His "Moonlit Night on the Dnipro" caused a true sensation in its time: in 1880 in St. Petersburg, people stood in lines for hours just to attend the exhibition of this single painting. The canvas was purchased by a nephew of the Russian emperor, who later decided to take it on a round-the-world voyage on a ship. This was highly discouraged, as the sea humidity could ruin the painting. Many tried to dissuade the ignorant member of the imperial court, and Kuindzhi himself even attempted to file a lawsuit to prevent the destruction of the masterpiece, but to no avail. Upon its return, it became clear that the painting had darkened and its appearance was irreversibly altered. Kuindzhi tried to recreate the painting and produced several copies of it. Some art historians argue that this very story may have been the decisive factor in Kuindzhi's decision to completely isolate himself while at the peak of his fame: for twenty years, Kuindzhi avoided any form of publicity, continuing to create in his studio at his home in Crimea, yet showing his works to no one.

Through the fate of Kuindzhi and his creative legacy, one can trace several methods (out of a large spectrum of existing ones) of the genocide of Ukrainian culture: appropriate, devalue, steal, destroy, and distort memory. Imperial efforts were not in vain: for a long time, Kuindzhi was called a Russian artist worldwide. Only now is this mistake beginning to be corrected. For instance, the world-famous Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York finally recognized Kuindzhi as Ukrainian and began labeling his paintings accordingly. In March 2022, Russian occupiers destroyed the Kuindzhi Art Museum in Mariupol with a direct airstrike. Many of Arkhyp Kuindzhi's works were stolen by the Russians.