Painting Artifact, artist Oleksandr Yatsenko

• Artist: Oleksandr Yatsenko
• Title: "Artifact"
• Year: 2024
• Size: 140 × 190 cm
• Materials: oil, acrylic and phosphor pigments on canvas
• Original hand-painted artwork

Artifact depicts a fantastic sea creature resembling the blue glaucus, a tiny mollusc known as the blue sea dragon. Its elongated blue body crosses the canvas horizontally, and clusters of long pointed outgrowths, like feathers or tongues of flame, spread up and down from it. At the right edge the creature's tail bends upward in a steep loop. Above it, in the upper right, hovers a dark circle with a white ornament resembling an eye or a sign, lending the scene a mysterious, almost cosmic note. The whole image is set against a granular background that recalls a sandy seabed or a scattering of stars.

The work is made in oil and acrylic on canvas with the addition of phosphor pigments. The surface is built in a technique close to pointillism: both the creature and the background are composed of thousands of small dots of different colours and sizes that merge into a single image from a distance and turn into a shimmering mosaic up close. Thanks to the phosphors, the painting has a second appearance: in a photo taken in the dark under ultraviolet light, the background turns violet-purple, and the creature's outlines and individual dots begin to glow. According to the artist, the work was created between 2017 and 2024.

In ordinary light, the palette combines the cool light blue, azure and ultramarine tones of the creature with a warm ochre-golden background in which pink, red and grey dots flash. The contrast of warm and cool makes the figure feel three-dimensional and alive. In the dark under ultraviolet light the mood changes: the painting becomes nocturnal and mysterious, like the deep sea where living organisms glow.

Oleksandr Yatsenko is a contemporary Ukrainian painter (born 1980, Cherkasy) and a graduate of the painting faculty of the National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture in Kyiv. He combines traditional oil painting with elements of mosaic, graphics, pointillism and ornamental art. Fantastic landscapes, animals and sea creatures appear in his works, and natural forms join the recognisable with the symbolic and the surreal.

The large vertical 140 × 190 cm format makes Artifact the centrepiece of a room: a living room with high ceilings, a spacious hallway or a lounge area. The blue palette on a warm sandy background looks especially good in light interiors with a marine or Mediterranean feel. The phosphor pigments offer an extra option: with ultraviolet lighting the painting becomes a glowing panel, which can be an interesting solution for a home cinema, a bar or a lounge. It is an unusual gift for a man or a partner who loves the sea and the underwater world.