Lyubov Panchenko

Lyubov Mykhailivna Panchenko (Ukrainian: Любов Михайлівна Панченко; 2 February 1938 – 30 April 2022) was a Ukrainian visual artist and fashion designer. She was a member of the Ukrainian Women's Union. She belonged to the Sixtiers, a group of artists of the sixties who revived Ukrainian culture during the Khrushchev Thaw.

Lyubov was born on 2 February 1938 in the village of Yablunka. In the late 1950s she graduated from the Kyiv School of Applied Arts (embroidery department). Later, she worked in a tailoring workshop and at the same time expanded her horizons of knowledge of art, becoming interested in linocut. In 1968 she entered the evening department of the Faculty of Graphics of the Ukrainian Academy of Printing. In the 1960s she joined the Club of Creative Youth "Сучасник" [Wikidata] and became a member of its literary section, Brama.

Panchenko worked at the Design and Engineering Technological Institute as a fashion designer and at the Republican House of Models. At that time, her bright talent flourished: she created a series of watercolors, clothing models, embroidery patterns, graphic screensavers for books, paintings. Many of her embroidery works were showcased in the magazine "Soviet Woman".

She was known to have defended the Ukrainian language and culture. She painted pysanka Easter eggs, embroidered national costumes for choirs, and raised money to help political prisoners serving sentences for "anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda." With her participation, the tradition of koliadka caroling and vertep nativity scenes was revived in Kyiv.

Panchenko was awarded the Vasyl Stus Prize in 2001.

Because of the evident Ukrainian folk inspirations in her work, she never had an exhibition during the Soviet era. She relied financially on her fashion work and embroidery.

During the Bucha massacre, she was in her house for weeks without food. After Russian troops left the city, she was taken to a hospital in Kyiv, where for nearly a month doctors tried to save her life. She never recovered and died there on 30 April 2022 at the age of 84. It was reported that she died of starvation caused by the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

In 2008, the National Museum of Literature of Ukraine exhibited the anniversary exhibition of Lyubov Panchenko. Yevhen Sverstiuk, a human rights activist and poet at the time, remarked: “These works clearly bear the stamp of genius. She lives in her world, she opens this world to us."

In 2014, the Hrushevsky Museum [Wikidata] in Kyiv presented the exhibition "My World!" («Світе мій!»).

Panchenko's works are also exhibited in the private collections and Museum of the Sixtiers [Wikidata] in Kyiv.

• Любов Панченко: повернення: альбом / передм. Олена Лодзинська, Василь Перевальський, Діана Клочко ; упорядн. Олена Лодзинська, Любов Крупник ; переклад на англ. Ольга Грабар, Соломія Джаман, Олексій Плохотюк ; дизайн Олексій Чекаль. — Київ-Харків: Видавець Олександр Савчук, 2021. — 256 с., 270 іл. — ISBN 978-617-7538-74-4.