George Gordienko: An Amusing Life

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George Gordienko, "Seize Materials which Works It's the Idea that Burns," 2000

oil on board, 19.5" x 23.5"

Please join us for our opening reception on Saturday, January 18, 1:00 - 3:00 pm.

Winchester Galleries is delighted to open the new year by an exciting exhibition “An Amusing Life”, by George Gordienko, an artist and wrestler. The fascinating world created by Gordienko inspired us to curate an exhibition of works from his estate.  This collection is a part of a life-long adventure that led Gordienko from surrealism to cubism and abstract. The symbolic and surrealistic depictions of the narratives in vibrant colours take the viewer to the depth of Gordienko’s fantasy world. He pursued his passion for art through delicate and whimsical illustrations by adopting different techniques and materials.

Born in 1928 of first-generation Ukranian and Cossack-Canadian parents in North Winnipeg, Manitoba, by age 17 Gordienko received numerous awards for his physical prowess. However, recognizing his penchant for art, his father gave him his first oil paints and brushes at age 12, a few years before he constructed his son's first weight-lifting equipment. Art always came before wrestling, even at the beginning of Gordienko's career and world travels. 

Gordienko's early work displays a natural sense of colour and the ability to absorb lessons from art history. His training in London was traditional and academic, while his studies in Paris were probably more modernist and even avant-garde. The history of his art reveals an artist who quietly and quickly absorbed the lessons of the great European modernists like Pablo Picasso and Juan Miro. From 1976 to 1990, he lived in Italy. Gordienko died of melanoma in 2002.