What's most impressive about Vasily Reshchuk's ability as an artist is how he can take cheerful, almost blissful colors and use them to transform otherwise bleak and hopeless environments pocked with muddy tire ruts, cracked stucco facades, overgrown fields and hapless flats that abound in his native Russia.
Three years ago, for instance, the now 70-year-old artist painted "Winter Morning," a bright and hopeful landscape of the painter's hometown of Vladivostok, which in lesser hands might have resulted in a view into industrial hopelessness. Yet the painting is vibrant with color and the foreground's snowy road welcomes visitors into the sun-warmed village ahead. It's very soothing and it has already sold - even though the artist's fourth show at The Fountainhead Gallery in Queen Anne hadn't even begun yet.
In fact, several of the paintings on display there have already sold.
What: The artwork of Vasily Reshchuk
Where: Fountainhead Gallery, 625 W. McGraw St.
When: Through March 30
www.fountainheadgallery.com • 206-285-4467
"He's a very optimistic person," said Fountainhead co-owner Ron Peterson. "I think it shows in his art and people respond to that."
Dozens of the painter's works are on display through March at Fountainhead. Most of the paintings are done in either gouache or tempera on paper. Others are done in watercolors, pastels and oils. One of the primary reasons for paper is its ease to transport. When Reshchuk has an exhibit across the globe, right now it's exclusively Fountainhead, he can roll up the paintings and send them via DHL. As far as the medium, the quick dry times of gouache and tempera have proven valuable because the artist often had small windows of time for painting.
From 1966 to 1993, he worked as a top-rated cameraman, filming nearly 100 documentaries, many of them award winning. He always brought his case of paints, brushes and pencils during his travels. And in between tight filming schedules he would paint.
Just about all of the work on display at Fountainhead is from the last decade with Russian landscape the subject matter. Art lovers in the Northwest may be responding to the land and cityscapes because, as Peterson said, while Eastern Siberia and Seattle are worlds apart, "it's not that different from Seattle. Vladivostok is a big fishing port and so is Seattle." Peterson has had people from that remote area of Russia come into his gallery, look at Reshchuk's work and say in a tone dripping with sarcasm, "Vasily has an optimistic view of Vladivostok."
Reshchuk paints his landscapes while sitting outside with people walking by, occasionally peering at his easel. They look at the somewhat dreary landscape, then at Reshchuk's cheerful interpretation, and scratch their heads, Peterson said. He said people watching him paint don't see the value in the subject matter. But Reshchuk, according to Peterson, said that there is beauty everywhere, but that you just have to be open to it.
Reshchuk's paintings finding a home in the quaint corner gallery at McGraw Street in Queen Anne was a fluke at best. Fountainhead co-owner Sue Peterson befriended Carol Vipperman who had been teaching marketing courses in Russia, classes that were attended by Reshchuk's wife, Valentina Likhoyda. Befriending her, Vipperman learned of Likhoyda's husband the documentary maker and artist. She loved the art. Vipperman's colleague Bob Ness also loved the art and wanted to promote it. Vipperman mentioned Peterson's gallery and a match, as unlikely as it would seem, was formed.
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