Oleh Mykhaylovych Tistol (, born on 25 August 1960) is a Ukrainian artist, a representative of Ukrainian neo-baroque and one of the leaders of the Ukrainian New Wave.
Oleh Tistol was born in the urban-type settlement of Vradiivka, Mykolaiv Oblast to scientist-agriculturist Mykhaylo Fedorovych Tistol. In 1970 his mother, Bolharina (Tistol) Valentyna Serhiivna obtains a position of the regional management Head of culture. Oleh moves with his parents to Mykolaiv. He starts his art education in 1972 at the children's art school which has founded in Mykolaiv on his mother's initiative. In 1974 he enters Kiev Republican Art School, the Department of Painting, and moves to Kiev. In 1978-79 he works as a designer in Mykolaiv's Khudfond (Art Foundation). Between 1979âÂÂ1984 Tistol studies at the Lviv State Institute of Decorative and Applied Arts. In 1984 - 1986 he serves in the Army in military unit Makarov-1 where he gets acquainted with Konstantin (Vinny) Reunov.
In 1988 Oleh married the painter Marina Skugareva.
While the participation in the first Soviet-American exhibition Soviart Oleh Tistol get acquented with the artist Dmitry Kantorov, who invites him to Moscow's squat Furmanny Lane. At the end of 1988 Tistol and Reunov in cooperation with the curator Olga Sviblova start to exhibit their works in Glasgow, ReykjavÃÂk, Helsinki. Between 2002âÂÂ2009 Oleh Tistol works with the curator Olga Lopuhova (The joint retrospective project Khudfond (2009)).
Since 1993 he lives and works in Kyiv.
The art of Oleh Tistol (paintings, large-scale installations, photos, sculptures, and art objects) has always been in the center of the artistic process, what is illustrated by his regular participation in the international art events.
Tistol's art, which emerged at the edge of the Soviet and post-Soviet epochs, combined both a critique of Soviet culture with re-evaluation of its clichés, as well as the vital, joyful, and playful atmosphere, which largely defined the appeal of the âÂÂUkrainian new waveâÂÂ. Combining in his works the national and soviet symbols, myths and utopias he discovered for himself the notion of simulacrum â a copy with no original. Such a paradoxical self-sustainability of propaganda as substitution for the non-existing items unexpectedly unites propaganda with pop-art. Tistol was primarily interested in its formal aesthetic aspects - stencil plates, color back-ups, smoothly painted surfaces.
Oleh Tistol's early works, the large-scale paintings (âÂÂZinovy Bogdan Khmelnitskyâ (1988), âÂÂReunificationâ (1988), âÂÂThe Farewell of Slavyankaâ (1989), âÂÂExercise with Macesâ (1989)) demonstrate the main features of the Ukrainian âÂÂnew waveâ â free play with symbols, bright expressive colors, and special âÂÂexaggerationâ of artistic devices.
In 1987 Oleh Tistol and Konstantin Reunov pronounced the program âÂÂA Resolute Edge of National Post-EclecticismâÂÂ. Its main idea was the aspiration to outline the national space as a theme for studying, to renew and reconsider the art language, art traditions and foundations of the painting. The national tradition, which is often identified with "Cossack baroque", became the object of research of Ukrainian painters. Domestic mythologicality of the world outlooks, the retrospection of the orientations and the ambiguity of the stereotypes have been represented as a cultural drama, as its traditional features.
Simultaneously, starting from the middle of the 90s, Oleh Tistol and his fellow artist Mykola Matsenko began to develop the concept of âÂÂNatspromâ (âÂÂNational IndustryâÂÂ), or a study of the national stereotypes fixed in the surrounding environment. Their projects: âÂÂThe Museum of AtatürkâÂÂ, âÂÂThe Museum of ArchitectureâÂÂ, âÂÂThe Museum of UkraineâÂÂ, âÂÂThe Mother of Citiesâ - which combined painting, photography and art objects - are a perfect example of clarity and adequacy of the concept, as well as strictly determined authorsâ position. Architecture appears in this series, as a certain decoration, set capable of providing décor to most surprising life performances. At the same time, after having passed through the filters of artistic vision, both famous and ordinary buildings â the embodiment of gone-by styles and social ambitions â appeared as visions and ghosts, that at any moment are ready to relinquish their place to new architectural fantasies. In this way, the artistsâ works drew the Ukrainian publicâÂÂs attention to an extraordinarily important theme of manipulation with historical heritage marked by the popularity of âÂÂarchitectural re-constructionsâ which fulfilled many Ukrainian cities, having the traditional layouts, with the stylized fake buildings.
The theme of âÂÂstereotypesâ was continued by Oleh Tistol in his painting series âÂÂNational Geographyâ (1998âÂÂ2004) where he combined âÂÂthe localâ and âÂÂthe foreignâÂÂ, the authentic and the borrowed, the ethnic and the global problematic. The sources of this series were the old illustrated magazines with ethnographic photos of âÂÂdifferent tribesâÂÂ. National exoticism was viewed here as the contemporary strategy of âÂÂselling local brands in the global marketâÂÂ.
In 2000s, in early 2010s, Oleh Tistol portrayed some of his contemporaries.
Since 2006 Tistol is working on the project âÂÂU. B. K.â (the Russian abbreviation for âÂÂSouthern Coast of CrimeaâÂÂ). Continuing his search for stereotypes, the painter finds them in his everyday life. The principal subject of the project are the palm trees on Yalta's quay. It's also the continuation of the theme "national geography", where Crimea is the symbol of place for holidays, relaxation, paradise. Tistol is attracted by its man-made environment, which transforms the landscape into the part of a culture, as the palm trees are not authentic Crimea's trees, they were planted here in the 20th century, forming its "new stereotype". The different techniques such as photo, painting, drawing, used in "U. B. K.", passed one into another. The project contains the pictorial paintings and the cycles of prints, where the pages of school notebooks, quick notes, casual sketches, supermarket's receipts, bills from the hotels and laundries, letters, the invitations on the passed exhibitions and the air-plane tickets are used as a background.