Igor Grechanyk (b. 1960, Kyiv) is a sculptor and artist whose work blends philosophical symbolism and mytho-poetic imagery with a contemporary sculptural language. His creations are not merely physical objects but visualized fragments of spiritual experience, giving form to the undefined and inviting the viewer into a dialogue of co-creation.

Born into the family of renowned sculptor Viktor Grechanyk, Igor was immersed in art and music from an early age. He graduated from the Kyiv State Art Institute in 1984. His early career unfolded under the ideological pressures of Socialist Realism, which pushed him toward an inner nonconformism and the search for his own artistic language.

In his early series Titans and Gothic, Grechanyk found his voice—a fusion of classical plasticity with metaphysical intensity. From the late 1980s through the 1990s, he delved deeply into myth and archetype, creating the cycles Plastics of Myth (Ancient Gods) and the Guardians series. From the early 2000s, he began participating in major international exhibitions, collaborating with leading gallerists within the Imaginary Realism movement. This period saw the creation of landmark series such as Dimensions of Beauty and Metamorphoses, where his figures possess an architectural stability and read as symbols rather than incidental images—a rare blend of monumentality and surreal vision.

For Grechanyk, sculpture is a language of the spirit: “Only the spirit matters,” he says. “I materialize it in my own way… The spirit itself chooses both the form and the vessel through which its presence is fixed.”

A significant part of his work is monumental sculpture. Within the Ukrainian Saga cycle, he has created monuments to prominent cultural figures that serve as cultural ambassadors, carrying Ukrainian heritage into public spaces around the world. His large-scale public sculptures stand in Ukraine, Bulgaria, Austria, Azerbaijan, China, and Switzerland, becoming enduring landmarks and symbols of shared memory.

After 2014, Grechanyk expanded his practice into new directions. Cycles such as Time in Bronze and Labyrinth combine bronze with transparent, lace-like metal structures and dynamic interplay of light and shadow. The sculptural language of these works gives tangible form to the intangible, channeling the collective unconscious through highly symbolic, often surreal imagery. Grechanyk «reverses» the notion of substance, transforming the voids and caesurae in his frame-like forms into active spaces filled with meaning.

The dimension of video animation in his art is a natural extension of his sculptural ideas, dynamically expanding the possibilities of his imagery while retaining spiritual depth.
Since 2022, the war has become the central context of his art. Works such as 2022, Cry of the Shadow, and Ukrainian Madonna are both emotional and philosophical reflections on tragedy and resilience.

A series of museum solo exhibitions—the most recent being Tectonics of Time—brought together contemporary sculpture and digital art, creating a space of interaction between the material and the immaterial, between historical memory and visions of the future. It became a large-scale meditation on the transformation of epochs.

Collected by connoisseurs worldwide for its rare ability to touch the deep, archetypal layers of human perception, the art of Igor Grechanyk stands as one of the defining voices of his generation — a creator whose visions will remain as vital tomorrow as they are today.

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Aug 16 Igor Grechanyk · Winner Collectors Art Prize

Aug 17 Leticia (Leta) Herrera · Winner Collectors Art Prize

Aug 16 Kathleen Kilchenmann · Winner Collectors Art Prize