2019
A six-week course, «Introduction to Petrykivka style Folk Painting», St. Vladimir Institute, Toronto
born in Petrykivka, working in Canada
Oksana Pikush
Painter and teacher · murals and interiors
Taught by
Andrii Pikush, Maria Pikush and Ivan Dmytriuk
Open to
- Masterclasses and workshops
- Classes for children and adults
- Interior painting and murals
- Concerts and recitals
Oksana Pikush was born and raised in Petrykivka and learned the painting at home. Her teachers were her parents, Andrii Pikush, People's Artist of Ukraine, and Maria Pikush, Honoured Master of Folk Art, together with the master and teacher Ivan Dmytriuk. In a settlement where, as UNESCO puts it, every family has at least one practitioner, hers was the family the tradition ran through.
She works as a painter and teacher of Petrykivka art, specialising in interior décor and mural painting, and she teaches the style to children and adults. Her classes are painted with handmade brushes carried over from Petrykivka itself, which she supplies, and everyone leaves with a finished piece.
She trained in Ukraine as a violinist and took up classical vocal study at McGill University in Canada. She sings as a lyrical soprano in Ukrainian, English, Italian and French, and has worked with the Sheraton Cadwell Orchestras, the Zahrava drama theatre, the Maria Zankovetska theatre on its Canadian tour, and the Toronto choir Vesnivka.
Elsewhere
The record
Where the years went
- PetrykivkaLearned the painting at home from Andrii and Maria Pikush, with the master Ivan Dmytriuk
- UkraineTrained as a violinist
- CanadaClassical vocal training at McGill University
- NowPaints interiors and murals, and teaches the style to children and adults
Shown at
Where the work has travelled
2019–2021
In the line-up of the Capital Ukrainian Festival, Ottawa
ongoing
Teaches Petrykivka painting at Folk Camp Canada
2026
Petrykivka masterclass at UAFest, Carleton Place, 13 September
On stage
The same hands, holding a microphone
Oksana is also a lyrical soprano. These frames come from her own channel: Ukrainian songs in a vyshyvanka, in the halls of the diaspora in Canada.
From the same school
Work of the tradition this hand belongs to
Paper, wood and porcelain from the same Petrykivka line, each credited to its source.
Porcelain vase
Painted by Marfa Tymchenko
Overglaze painting on porcelain, made at the Kyiv experimental ceramic-art factory in the second half of the twentieth century.
Chest, «Blue flowers»
Painted by Nataliia Statyva-Zharko
A painted wooden chest in a cool blue range, away from the red-and-gold the factory made familiar.
Plate, «August»
A wooden plate with a peacock at its centre, ringed by a running border.
Poppies and cornflowers
A hand-painted sheet in the classic red-and-blue field pairing.
Casket with viburnum, 1980s
A wooden casket where the berry clusters show the finger technique clearly.
Casket with a bird, 1980s
Factory work on a black ground — the look the Druzhba factory made the public image of the craft.
Casket on black, about 1985
Ukrainian SSR production. The black ground is an industrial import and was never traditional here.