Vasyl Polevoy Signed Modernist Lithograph — Blue Woman - Ed. 12

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A rare and deeply evocative original color lithograph by celebrated Ukrainian modernist artist Vasyl Polevoy (b. 1936), titled Blue Woman … Read more A rare and deeply evocative original color lithograph by celebrated Ukrainian modernist artist Vasyl Polevoy (b. 1936), titled Blue Woman (Голубая женщина) in the artist's own hand on the verso. Numbered 12 from a strictly limited, highly exclusive edition, this work stands as an incredibly elusive example of Polevoy's Soviet-era graphic output. No comparable examples from this series are currently known on the secondary market.

Vasyl Polevoy received his rigorous technical training at the prestigious Leningrad Vera Mukhina Higher School of Art and Design before establishing his studio practice in Moscow. By the late 1960s, astute Western collectors began quietly acquiring his graphic pieces. By the 1970s, however, Polevoy fell heavily out of favor with Soviet authorities for his refusal to conform to state-mandated Communist Party socialist realism. The bold, dissident nature of this non-conformist period defines the peak historical and structural significance of his career.

The fragmented, surrealist figurative form, saturated blue-green palette, and sharp, graphic white contour line work are hallmarks of Polevoy’s signature vocabulary. The piece marries mid-century modernism with a distinct folk-inflected structural quality, firmly anchoring him alongside the premier underground Soviet non-conformist artists of the mid-20th century.

Art features excellent double-signature documentation, as it is signed within the image plate matrix and hand-signed again by the artist in pencil below on the matting. The title and edition number are hand-inscribed in Cyrillic on the verso. The lithograph is housed in its original, mid-century warm-toned metal gallery frame with a wide, archival-style mat.

This piece was part of the collection built by Eve Paige Spencer, an enamel artist represented in the permanent collection of the Ruth Chandler Williamson Gallery at Scripps College, and her husband, writer and art collector Donner Spencer. Polevoy's Ukrainian modernist lithograph speaks to the collection's reach beyond American mid-century art.

Dimensions:
20¼"H × 16¼"W (frame)
11⅝" H × 8¼" W (art) See less