Spring in the Mountains

Andrii Andriiovych Kotska was a Ukrainian painter, an Honored Artist of Ukraine (1971), and a People's Artist of Ukraine (1982). Born on May 23, 1911 in Uzhhorod, in 1927, he became a student of the Uzhhorod Teachers' Seminary, where drawing was taught by the founder of the Transcarpathian art school Adalbert Erdeli. Kotska also attended the Uzhhorod Public Drawing School under teachers Adalbert Erdeli and Yosyp Bokshai. In 1933, he became a member of the Society of Fine Arts in Subcarpathian Rus'. In the same year, Kotska organized his first personal exhibition of works in Uzhhorod. In 1940, he was awarded a scholarship to study at the Roman Academy of Fine Arts under the guidance of Professor F. Ferrazzi at the Department of Monumental Painting. For his successful studies, his scholarship was extended until 1942 at the Academy of St. Luke. After the creation of the Transcarpathian Regional Organization of the Union of Soviet Artists of Ukraine in 1946, A. Kotska became a founding member. Throughout his creative life, the artist was an active participant in art exhibitions. The most successful were personal exhibitions in Uzhhorod (1981), Moscow (1983), and Trebišov (Czechoslovakia, 1984). A. Kotska's works are original in style and distinguished by impeccable color. Some of his works are "Fair", "Mariyka", "Schoolchildren", "Boy" (all - 1930), "Portrait of a Girl" (1944), "Tatyana Yablonska" (1948), "Girl from Kolochava" (1952), "Verkhovynka" (1956), "Bride" (1968), "Winter" (1973), "In the Carpathians" (1979), and others. He died on November 3, 1987 in Uzhhorod. The artist's works are kept in many museum, gallery and private collections in Ukraine and abroad.