Leo Print

Before I became an artist. I was born and raised in the USSR in the South of Ukraine in 1972, all my childhood was spent on the Black Sea coast which fascinated and inspired me. The world of art was opened for me by my father, who was very fond of drawing. As a child, I had a lot of friends and they all loved art, they loved a beautiful world. Once my friend invited me to visit his father’s art studio, it all started with this. It was there that I discovered that there are people who paint beautiful, amazing things, and this is their profession and not a hobby. I was very inspired to draw a lot. I did not show my work to anyone. These were surreal stories with very deep experiences of a child who grew up in a red ghetto. I survived in the desert, breathing where it was forbidden to breathe. My inner world of children did not match the world in which I lived. Even then, in my youth, I was sure that I would be in prison for dissent. At 16, I started having problems with the KGB. In an effort to prove our independence, my friends and I planned to flee abroad. But at 18 I found out about God and believed in Christ. Love for God and a desire to serve Him became the center of my life and I abandoned painting. At that time, art seemed to be unimportant. In a youthful impulse, I took all my paintings to the yard, put them together and set fire to it. The bonfire was big, just huge, but this fire was the beginning of a new path. Many years have passed since then, and many changes in my life. I met my wife, we have three children and I became an Orthodox priest. He founded a mission in prison, began to help prisoners. Art has returned to my life. I founded an icon painting workshop. A lot of work has been created. Over 60 solo exhibitions around the world were opened as an icon painter, four catalogs were published. The icon has become the center of my life. I have mastered jewelry. In 2014, I was awarded the Faberge Memorial Fund by the Small Order named after Franz Birbaum with the award of the honorary title “Chief Master”. In 2019, I started working on a book about my ministry in prison and the people who are there. We live in a complex but inspiring world, and there are so many things that I want to convey. And a few years ago Aurora was born. Under this pseudonym, I draw, illustrate everything that I could never convey in any other form. I did not set goals to conquer the viewer with something new. I live in my world and invite you to this world.