Met Museum Recognizes Aivazovsky, Kuindzhi, Repin as Ukrainian Artists

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York recognized Ivan Aivazovsky, Arkhyp Kuindzhi, and Ilya Repin as Ukrainian, not Russian, artists.

That’s according to journalist Oksana Semenik referring to the metmuseum.org website, Ukrinform reports.

The caption to the portrait of writer Vsevolod Garshin (1884), which is showcased in the museum’s gallery, now states that it is the work of the Ukrainian artist Ilya Repin.

The caption to the painting Red Sunset reads that it was painted by the Ukrainian artist Arkhyp Kuindzhi.

Earlier, all three artists were listed as Russian.

Also, this museum changed the name of the painting by the French impressionist Edgar Degas "Russian Dancer" to "Dancer in Ukrainian Dress".

Ilya Repin is a Ukrainian painter of Cossack descent, nicknamed Ripa, who was born in 1844 in the city of Chuhuyiv, then Kharkiv province, but later studied at the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts and made his paintings in the Russian Empire, according to UP.

Ivan Aivazovsky was born in Fedosia in 1817 into the family of an Armenian shopkeeper, whose family moved to Crimea from Galicia in 1812, where his ancestors came from Western Armenia. He also studied at the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts and is often considered a Russian artist. Aivazovsky lived and worked in Crimea.

Kuindzhi, who was of Greek descent, was born in Mariupol. He was initially a member of the 19th-century Russian Realist art movement, The Wanderers.