Shepherd Alih Moldakhanov

Stepan Illich Dudnyk was a Soviet artist, a People's Artist of the RSFSR (1984) and a Honored Artist of the RSFSR (1968). Born in Yevpatoria on December 10, 1914, he studied at the Graphic Department of the Moscow Art Institute (1934-1943) under D. Kardovskyi, O. Osmiorkin, graduated from the institute with honors and remained for graduate school (1943-1946). A member of the Union of Artists of the USSR (1944), from 1943, he participated in exhibitions. He taught at the Moscow Art Institute (1946-1952), the Kharkiv Art Institute (1952-1953), the Stroganov Higher Art and Industrial School (1967-1974), and the Moscow Pedagogical Institute (1976-1981). In the 1950s and 1960s, Dudnyk traveled extensively in Altai, Central Asia, Novokuznetsk, and Kemerovo. From these travels, he brought many works: rural and urban landscapes, and portraits of scientists and rural workers. In the 1960s and 1980s, the decorative element began to appear more and more strongly in his work, especially in landscapes and still lifes. In the 1980s, he created a number of triptychs, in which a tendency towards monumentalization of the image can be traced. He lived and worked in Moscow and died on July 8, 1996. Dudnyk's works are in museums in Ukraine, Russia, Germany, Bulgaria, the USA, the Netherlands, Japan, and Great Britain.