INTERVIEW

From founding Ukraine’s first private gallery in Odesa to rebuilding her practice on the shores of South Africa and Cyprus, Ukrainian artist Tatyana Binovska reflects on art, displacement, and the sea that runs through her work.

Tatyana Binovska

Tatiana Binovska’s story begins in eastern Ukraine and stretches, by way of Odesa, across continents and coastlines. Born in what is now Bakhmut and shaped as an artist in the south, she came of age at a moment when Ukraine was breaking away from the Soviet system and trying to define itself in every sphere, including culture. For her, painting was never only about the studio. It was also about the conditions that make art possible: the spaces where it can be shown, the audiences it can reach, and the networks of people needed to sustain it.

In Odesa she became known not only for her own work, but for creating platforms for others. At a time when opportunities were scarce and institutions slow to adapt, she set about building exhibition spaces with practical, entrepreneurial resolve. Those years placed her at the centre of a lively, sometimes contested cultural scene, where the effort to make art public collided with questions of taste, money, influence and authority. The experience left its mark: a clear view of what cultural work demands, and how easily it can be misread.

If there is a single thread running through her life and canvases, it is water. The sea is not a decorative motif in her case; it is a condition of existence, something she returns to physically and imaginatively. The maritime atmosphere of Odesa, and later the coastal landscapes of southern Africa and the Mediterranean, became more than backdrops. They shaped her palette, her sense of light, and her approach to mood and space. Travel widened her visual vocabulary, but it also sharpened her attachment to home, particularly as Ukraine moved through successive shocks and, ultimately, full-scale war.

The invasion forced many Ukrainian artists into the hardest set of choices: whether to remain, where to go, how to keep working, and how to stay useful. For Binovska, the question of contribution was never abstract. Her response has combined continued painting with efforts to support cultural and charitable initiatives, to keep connections alive, and to ensure Ukrainian voices are not reduced to a footnote in international art circuits.

EU Today’s Gary Cartwright spoke with her at length about these turns of fate and intention: the discipline of early training, the ambition and strain of building galleries, the personal decisions behind relocation, and the way images arrive — sometimes as deliberate composition, sometimes as something that insists on being painted. What follows is a portrait of an artist whose life has been shaped by place, movement and rupture, and whose work continues to test what endures when everything around you changes.

Interview: Tatyana Binovska

Gary Cartwright: You were born in Artemivsk, now Bakhmut — a city that has been devastated and occupied. What does it mean to you today, and has the war changed what you feel compelled to paint?

Tatyana Binovska: I was born in Bakhmut, in Donetsk region, in what was then the Soviet Union. My parents lived in Odesa, and for most of my life I thought of myself as an Odesa person. I was proud of it. Bakhmut was simply where my mother’s family lived, and that is why she gave birth there.

Only later did I begin to learn the city’s real history. At school, the history we were taught was designed to erase Ukrainian roots. The truth reached me much later and, in a sense, I discovered not only the true name and past of the city where I was born, but also myself. For a long time I could not understand why I did not fit the rules and expectations around me. Then it became clear: I am Ukrainian, and I am independent.

When the war began, I followed what was happening in Bakhmut and tried to think practically. I have spent more than 25 years promoting art and culture. My husband and I have also built up a serious collection of painting and graphics. I thought: perhaps I can do something for the city of my birth — create a museum, or a contemporary art gallery there. I began mapping out the steps and realised I would need to work through the city leadership. I made contact with a local official and put forward a proposal, including the possibility of donating part of my own work, and part of our family collection, to a future museum — and even coming in person for the opening.

The only thing left was to identify premises. My proposal was passed on to the mayor. For a moment it seemed possible. Then the full-scale invasion came, and the city was seized by occupiers. That plan became impossible.

As for painting, war changes the inner climate. It changes the nervous system. New work appears under a different kind of pressure, even when the subject is not directly “war”. You carry it anyway.

Gary Cartwright: You studied at the Grekov Art College in Odesa. What did that training demand of you — drawing, colour, composition?

Tatyana Binovska: Discipline. Seriousness. A refusal to be superficial. I studied with Konstantin Vladimirovich Filatov. He knew how to tune students to real work. He was strict and did not allow much self-expression at the beginning, but that strictness has value: it builds craft.

For me, composition became central. Whatever I do, composition is the key that holds the work together. You can have colour, you can have line, you can have emotion — but if the composition collapses, the painting collapses.

Gary Cartwright: In the 1990s you created “Art Studio” and then developed galleries in Odesa, including the Maritime Art Gallery. What was the cultural atmosphere in Odesa then — and what did those first projects look like in practice?

Tatyana Binovska: After art college I began looking for where I belonged professionally. It was not simple. There were many artists, and there was nowhere to show work. I moved through several jobs and eventually worked at the Odesa Production Art Combine. In the Soviet model you could have stayed there until retirement. But Perestroika happened, everything began to shift, and it became clear you had to find new routes.

That is when I decided to create a gallery — a private gallery. At that time, it almost did not exist. My gallery became the first private gallery in Ukraine. We called it “Art Studio”. It ran from 1991 to 2000. In practice it meant doing everything: finding space, building relationships, persuading people that exhibitions mattered, bringing the public in, and supporting artists who had no platform.

From “Art Studio” the Maritime Art Gallery was born. After our first exhibition of marine art, the thought became fixed: Odesa needed a dedicated maritime gallery. The sea is part of the city’s identity, but it needed a serious cultural expression.

The Maritime Art Gallery

Gary Cartwright: How did the Maritime Art Gallery take shape — and why did it become so significant?

Tatyana Binovska: I began looking for a partner with real capacity. I was speaking with local model-makers who built ships, and I came across a brochure for an American maritime gallery. It made me think: why not here? Odesa is a port city. We should have something at that level.

At first I tried to interest large maritime structures. Leadership changed, and my ideas were not a priority. Later, through persistence and meetings, I began visiting the port more often. There was a crucial moment: I asked the head of the Odesa port, Mykola Panteleimonovych Pavliuk, to take the gallery under the port’s wing. Before that, our premises were damp — it was like being under water; you could not defeat the humidity.

The port later built a dedicated building for the gallery, with a total area of 1,070 square metres. The Maritime Art Gallery operated from 1993 to 2009 and, at the time, was among Ukraine’s leading galleries. Ships berthed directly beneath the windows. It was an extraordinary setting.

Most importantly, it was independent in its activity — not dependent on local authorities and not dependent on the artists’ union. That independence mattered.

Gary Cartwright: You ran those spaces for years. Why did you step away from organisational work in 2009 — and what changed in your painting afterwards?

Tatyana Binovska: First, I changed. Over those years, the more freedom and independence you gain, the more hostility your work can generate. Cultural work can provoke resistance, misunderstandings, accusations. It is exhausting.

There were family reasons too. By that time our elder daughter had married and moved to South Africa. She had a baby, and when the child was only a few months old, her husband left. We made the decision to leave everything and go to Cape Town to help our daughter. What we had done for Odesa and for Ukraine felt, at that moment, as if it was not needed by anyone; our family needed us more.

At the same time, I did not leave the work behind completely. In 2009 I created an online gallery on Facebook — Binovska Gallery — and it has been operating for 16 years now. All my projects for artists exist thanks to that platform.

In my own painting there was also a shift of energy: less administration, more direct work in the studio — and different light, a different rhythm.

Gary Cartwright: The sea returns repeatedly in your life and in your paintings. Often you combine sea imagery with female figures. What does that connection mean to you?

Tatyana Binovska: I did not become a marine painter, even though I organised maritime exhibitions for many years. But I simply cannot live without the sea. It is physical. It is psychological.

In 2016 I won an art residency competition and spent time in Australia. Melbourne is a good city, but it is not a sea city in the way I need. The sea there felt as if it had no smell. I still travelled to the Great Barrier Reef, and I loved it — but it is not only about seeing water; it is about living with it.

Cape Town, where we lived for about ten years, gave me a feeling of real happiness. The ocean is real magic. And now, because of aggression and war, we have ended up on Cyprus. Again I am close to the sea. I cannot imagine my life far from it.

As for women and the sea, I do not treat it as illustration. The sea is a force; the female figure is also a force — different forms of energy, vulnerability, resilience. The viewer will read their own meanings, but for me it is a language of inner states, not a postcard.

Gary Cartwright: Your cycle “Ah, Africa” is often mentioned. What, specifically, did Africa give you as a painter — and what changed in your palette or technique?

Tatyana Binovska: The desire to create a series devoted to Africa came after my first visit to Cape Town in 2005. Before that, Africa in my head was largely a cliché: red soil, heat, something abstract. South Africa broke that. It felt like a festival of life. Human warmth filled me. I am a person who likes to live at a high note; I like energy, smiles, joy. I did not feel that atmosphere in Ukraine at the time, and Africa struck me as a different world.

When I returned from that trip, full of impressions, I began work immediately. The first exhibition opened in January 2006 at the Maritime Art Gallery in Odesa, supported by the South African Embassy in Ukraine. We presented this “hot” project in winter — even the lighting was arranged to create the sensation of African sunlight.

After Odesa the project travelled. Kyiv was the first stop — at a museum space connected to national treasures — and later other cities: Dnipro, Kharkiv, Nikopol, Sevastopol, and more.

In many places we found local African music groups; the embassy brought South African wine; the openings became events rather than formalities. The final exhibition of the cycle took place in April 2010.

In painting terms, Africa pushed my colour and my sense of light. It sharpened brightness. It changed the emotional temperature of the work.

Gary Cartwright: You have lived and exhibited in different places — Belgium, Australia, South Africa, Cyprus. How did those moves change your daily working routine and the kind of light you paint?

Tatyana Binovska: Place changes everything: the rhythm of the day, the quality of light, the feeling of space. Even in Odesa, when the gallery space was semi-basement, the light was dim and damp. I wanted brightness and happiness, and that desire entered the early series where I tried to “sound” colour and line — to paint as if colour and line were music.

Cape Town gave me what I had always sought — love and a powerful sense of life. And something unexpected happened: angels began appearing on my canvases. I did not plan that. It arrived.

Melbourne was different again. The work I painted there was different in style. It also taught me something about the art world: you have to promote yourself constantly. Without that, you can simply disappear.

Cyprus arrived suddenly, through war rather than choice. The routine becomes survival first, then work. But you still work.

Gary Cartwright: One of your biographies mentions a monumental project in Bruges, using cold encaustic. What was it — materials, scale, theme — and does it still exist?

Tatyana Binovska: It was in 1996, when we were already running two galleries, that I received a commission connected to Hotel De Medici in Bruges. I learned a specific technique — cold encaustic — and created three large murals. I began with sketches and then executed the work fully.

As far as I know, the paintings are still there. I am told they remain in excellent condition and still please visitors and guests.

Gary Cartwright at Hotel De Medici, Bruges, standing in front of a mural by Tatyana Binovska.

Gary Cartwright: You have works titled “The Taste of Victory” (2022) and others shaped by recent years. What do you want viewers to notice first in those paintings?

Tatyana Binovska: In Odesa, early on, I was trying to express music through painting — to paint melodies with colour and line. I was young and not confident, and my “collections” were rather chaotic. Later I understood the value of series: you can return to them, develop them, deepen them.

In Limassol I have painted several works in that same beloved style — but now the melodies are different. These are not the earlier “songs”. These are the notes that broke into our lives. I think a viewer can hear that change, even if they cannot name it.

Gary Cartwright: Since February 2022, how exactly have you supported Ukraine through your art — and can you name the recipients or results where possible?

Tatyana Binovska: When war came, many people left and many stayed. I thought painfully about what we Ukrainians had lost — as if the ground had disappeared under our feet. I also needed to feel useful.

After I ended gallery work in 2009, I continued with a gallery structure. People can accuse you of “earning money on artists”, so I chose a different model. And the online gallery — Binovska Gallery — became the foundation for everything I did later for artists.

Later, representatives of an international art platform approached me. They needed Ukrainian artists. They supported them, and many works were sold at auction. Unfortunately, that platform did not survive, but at the time it gave people a route to participation and support, and it helped me focus my mind away from catastrophe and towards action.

In 2024, after viewing my online gallery, a representative of PICTA-24 — an Italian contemporary art festival project in Forlì — contacted me. Ukrainian participants were included. Later, within the project, I was recognised as a representative responsible for social links with Europe. It is a cultural route, but also a practical one: it builds visibility and strengthens networks at a time when the country itself is under assault.

Gary Cartwright: Beyond Ukraine, what causes or initiatives do you support — and how do you decide whether to attach your name to a campaign?

Tatyana Binovska: The internet has widened opportunities, but it has also widened deception. Many so-called “international exhibitions” exist mainly to collect registration fees. The invitations look impressive; the titles are grand. I advise artists to check who is behind an offer, verify the organisation properly, and look at its history.

Even I can be tempted by advertising. Recently I accepted one invitation and later discovered that an exhibition with a big name was essentially a presentation for a single artist. I do not want to discredit my country through careless associations. So the decision is practical: is it real, is it serious, does it respect artists, and does it carry any reputational risk?

Gary Cartwright: How does a painting begin for you, and how do you know it is finished?

Tatyana Binovska: If you mean composition — it is a fascinating question. The image can come from concentrated thought, from breathing exercises, and sometimes it appears from nowhere.

Recently the image of a panther at night came to me — it “asked” to be painted. Another time I began a work about a girl searching for her beloved, and I saw the tenderness of hydrangeas under moonlight. These are not programmes. They arrive.

Sometimes feelings tear at the soul and you simply have to pour them onto the canvas. I used to think everything could be controlled. Now I understand that sometimes you cannot avoid what comes.

A painting is finished when it holds together — when the composition settles and the inner sound becomes stable, when there is nothing left to add that does not weaken it.

Gary Cartwright: If you had to choose three paintings to represent yourself today, which would they be — and what should a one-line caption say for each?

Tatyana Binovska: “Different Worlds, or Those Who Live on the Hill.”
“Unconquered and Independent.”
“Save and Protect.”

Each one carries its own statement. The captions should be short enough not to explain the painting away.

Gary Cartwright: What are you working on now — and where can readers see the work next?

Tatyana Binovska: In the last days of the year I completed three works at once. Two are “Our Lesya” and “Return”; “Return” was commissioned by a collector.

Next year I will take part again in the PICTA project. I am also preparing a series of portraits to publish through my online channels.

Working like this, I understood something simple about my creative nature: my art is made from many ingredients. The best comparison I can give is borshch — there is a lot in it, and that is why it tastes as it does.

As the conversation ends, Binovska returns to the practicalities that have defined much of her life: making work, sustaining networks, and staying close to the sea. Her career has moved between private initiative and public visibility, between the demands of building cultural platforms and the solitude of the studio. War and displacement have altered the geography of that life, but not its direction.

What comes through most clearly is a refusal to be passive — whether in the effort to create spaces for artists in Odesa, in the decision to start again abroad, or in the attempt to keep a Ukrainian cultural presence visible in international settings. The paintings that accompany this interview follow the same line: rooted in place, shaped by movement, and marked by a determination to hold on to identity without softening it for anyone else.

In the months ahead she plans further exhibitions and new portrait work, continuing from Cyprus while keeping her attention on Ukraine. For Binovska, the work is not a retreat from events, but a way of meeting them: through colour, composition, and the steady insistence that culture, like independence, is something that has to be made — and defended.

Exhibitions
Tatyana Binovska has taken part in more than 50 group exhibitions internationally and has staged more than 30 solo exhibitions.

Awards

• 2002 – Saint Sofia honorary award, for personal contribution to the development of culture in Ukraine

• 2002 – Harmony Program Award (Los Angeles, United States)

• 2003 – Order of Champion of Peace

• 2021 – Winner, Fine Art America Billboards Contest

• 2021 – Winner, Amber Nugget Award (Writers’ Union of North America; International Academy for the Development of Literature and Art)

• 2021 – Laureate, International Art Competition Movement

• 2022 – Diploma, Illia Repin International Art Prize