«The Strong-Willed Face of National Post-eclecticism»: Ukrainian Art-Association of the last quarter of the XX century in the Culture of the Era

The program of activity of the Kiev art association The Strong-Willed Face of National Post-eclecticism (1987 — early 1990s) was analyzed in the context of the history of Ukrainian Art of transition from the time of Perestroika to the first years of Independence. It is shown that at that time art historians were not as popular as practical artists were plotting new intellectual lines of generalization and reflection on social events, the creators themselves became at the helm of artistic interpretation of reality, its transformation and explanation for themselves and the audience of those phenomena. It was found that the important for artists of the The Strong-Willed Face… was the conceptual, ideological content of creativity, its principal manifestation: O. Tistol, K. Reunov, N. Matsenko, Ya. Bystrovа and M. Skugareva had their own creative concept, adhered to it in their works that distinguishes their work of this time among other representatives of the New Wave. It was found that, on the one hand, the creativity of the artists The Strong-Willed Face… was an offshoot of the New Wave, fitting into this phenomenon for a number of signs (vitalism, pictorial expressiveness, propensity for play and mythologization); on the other hand, The Strong-Willed Face… occupied a separate niche in the above artistic process, is characterized by a focus on national issues, actualization of the issue of national identity and carried out a kind of artistic and cultural research in this area by means of not art history, but visual art itself.