Babentsov, Viktor

Viktor Vladimirovich Babentsov (1921-2012)

Soviet Ukrainian artist and graphic artist, People’s Artist of Ukraine, member of the USSR Academy of Arts, Viktor Vladimirovich Babentsov was born on February 5, 1921 in the village of Litvinovka (now part of the city of Verkhnedneprovsk) of the Dnipropetrovsk region. In 1938 – 1939 he studied at the Dnepropetrovsk Art College. He fought in the Great Patriotic War and received military awards in recognition of his service. From 1946 to 1952 he studied at the Kiev Art Institute under K. Trokhimenko and V. Kostetskiy.

In 1951, the painting “The Test of Steel” by V. Babentsov in co-authorship with D. Shostak was exhibited for the first time at the all republic art exhibition. Later, he was an active participant in city, all republic and all-union art exhibitions. A member of the Union of Artists of Ukraine since 1956, he was the author of monumental pictorial compositions dedicated to the work of metallurgists, the October Revolution and the Great Patriotic War. Babenstov was a master of portrait and landscape and was awarded the title “Honored Worker of the Ukrainian SSR” in 1977 and People’s Artist of Ukraine in 2004. In March 2011, the Russian Museum in Kyiv hosted a personal exhibition of VV Babentsov, dedicated to the 90th anniversary of the artist’s birth. His works are kept in the National Art Museum of Ukraine, in Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, Donetsk, Cherkassy, Berdyansk Art Museums and other museums and private collections in Ukraine and abroad.