Painting Koliada Is Coming, artist Orest Tsyupko

• Artist: Orest Tsyupko
• Title: "Koliada Is Coming"
• Year: 2024
• Size: 80 × 60 cm
• Materials: acrylic on canvas
• Original hand-painted artwork

"Koliada Is Coming" shows a group of carol singers walking across a snowy hill on a winter night. In front is a young man in a hat and an embroidered sheepskin vest, raising a Christmas star high on a long pole. Behind him crowd the mummers: a figure in a horned goat mask, a man in a hat with a patterned cloth thrown over his shoulder, a king in a golden crown, a hooded figure, and a youth in a blue coat carrying a bag. On the right, a boy with a trumpet brings up the rear. In the background rises a dark wooden church with a sharp spire and a glowing window, and above the whole scene an angel in white robes floats, blowing a golden trumpet.

The painting is done in acrylic in the artist's characteristic stylised manner. The figures are elongated and slightly simplified, the faces defined by a few confident lines, and the clothing built from broad planes of colour. The sky is laid in with even layers, while the snow at the bottom and in the upper right corner is rendered as a web of sharp pale strokes, scratched in or applied with a dry brush, which convey frosty air and a snowstorm. The star and the crown are picked out in textured golden paint. The signature "Цюпко О." with the date "24" appears in the lower right corner.

The palette is almost monochrome: deep blue, sky blue, steel grey and white set the cold atmosphere of a winter night. Against this background the gold of the star and crown, the yellow church window and the boy's brass trumpet flash as warm accents. The mood is solemn and a little mysterious: not a noisy celebration, but the moment when the carollers set out to bring people the Christmas news.

Orest Tsyupko is a Ukrainian painter and a member of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine who lives and works in Khust, Transcarpathia. He graduated from the Lviv State Institute of Applied and Decorative Arts and works in landscape, still life, portraiture and genre painting; a Transcarpathian catalogue of his works includes genre and religious-philosophical subjects.

The horizontal 80 × 60 cm format suits a living or dining room where the family gathers for the holidays, as well as a hallway or study. The restrained blue and white palette pairs well with light walls, wood and textiles in calm tones. The painting makes a warm Christmas gift for a man, a colleague or anyone who cherishes Ukrainian traditions.