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George Gordienko (1928 - 2002)

A Major Retrospective Exhibition

MARCH 5 - MARCH 25, 2006

Preview: Saturday, March 4, 10 am - 5:30 pm

(work subject to prior sale)

Opening Reception: Sunday, March 5, 1:00 pm - 5:00 pm

Elizabeth Ely, harpest

Special Guest: Marchesi Christina Tassou, representing George Gordienko's artwork in Italy and Germany

George Gordienko: An Introduction to the Man and his Art

George Gordienko was an artist and wrestler. Weighing close to 300 pounds of solid muscle in his world-class wrestling prime, he could, at the same time, create the most delicate and mysterious Surrealist paintings in exquisite colours. How this massive Canadian wrestler came to be such a gentle artist and person is a life-long adventure worthy of a creation by Ernest Hemingway.

Born in 1928 of first generation Ukranian and Cossack-Canadian parents in North Winnipeg, Manitoba, by age 17 Gordienko had 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. However, at the same time, being the good son of hardworking immigrants with ambitions for their growing family, at age 20 Gordienko entered pre-med studies with the intention of becoming a family-doctor.

Later, while wrestling in the United States and Europe, Gordienko studied art in San Francisco, London and Paris, as well as back in Winnipeg. And, though he became famous throughout much of the world for his fighting skill, studying the art in the world's great museums, including those in Japan, the Middle-East and South America, and meeting great artists such as Pablo Picasso and Juan Miro, was his primary reason for travel - and explains why he always traveled without an entourage. When he retired in the heavy-weight world-champion class in 1976 he settled in northern Italy and turned wholeheartedly to painting. Exhibiting his art in Italy, Paris, London and Canada, Gordienko continued to live in Europe until 1990. Finally he established his home and studio in Black Creek in the Comox Valley of Vancouver Island, British Columbia, where he continued to paint until his death in 2002.

Gordienko's early work displays a natural sense of colour and 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.

Brian Grison
- (To read the full version of Brian Grison's "George Gordienko: An Introduction to the Man and his Art" click here)