Yevheniy Prokopov. 2016. Florida, USA. Yevheniy Prokopov’s private archives
The images-symbols have reached the perfection of the calligraphic content of the sign. E. Prokopov’s ingenuity as a plastic artist allows us to consider him a talented successor of Arkhypenko’s avant-garde style.
Olga Petrova, art historian
Yevgeniy Prokopov is a prominent contemporary Ukrainian and American sculptor, creator of some iconic monuments for Ukrainians in Ukraine and abroad, Honored Artist of Ukraine (1989), member of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine (1978) and the International Sculpture Center (2022).
The artist was born on May 4, 1950, in Kyiv, in the family of Ukrainian artist Yosyp Prokopov. He graduated from the Kyiv Art Institute (1975) and completed postgraduate studies at the USSR Academy of Arts (1980). Since 1998 he has been living in the United States, becoming a member of the Ukrainian diaspora.
Yevgeniy Prokopov works in monumental and easel sculpture with bronze, aluminum, and stone materials. He was one of the first to use mirror-polished steel, and in his reliefs, he uses random effects of galvanized copper plates in combination with incorporated subjects. Since the 1990s, he has moved from narrative compositions and portraits to meaningful metaphors and laconic forms. The main themes are philosophical reflection of human existence, motherhood, love, and classical religious subjects. The artist’s works are characterized by the maximum use of material properties, an emphasis on surfaces, avant-garde techniques of “broken form,” and spatial pauses, which convey deep meanings through generalized symbolic forms.
The most famous works of Yevgeniy Prokopov include the memorial of Taras Shevchenko “Prometheus” on the facade of the National Museum of Taras Shevchenko in Kyiv (1988), the memorial to students and teachers of the Kyiv University “The Way of Cognition,” Patriarch Josyf Slipyj in Chicago (2009), The Heavenly Hundred Heroes and all fallen Heroes of Ukraine in Bloomingdale near Chicago (2015) ⎼ the first monument to the Heavenly Hundred. It is also worth mentioning the sculptures “Memory” on the territory of St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Cathedral in Kyiv (1988), for the restoration of which he was awarded the Archangel Michael Medal of the OCU in 2019; “Unity of Faith” in Reinhardtsdorf-Schena (Germany, 1989), “Lamentation” in Ternopil (1990), “Red Square” in Brookline (USA, 2001), “To Victory!” in Taipei (Taiwan, 2008).
Yevgeniy Prokopov had over 20 personal exhibitions in Ukraine, the USA, Germany, and Denmark. His works are kept in the National Museum “Kyiv Art Gallery,” the National Art Museum of Ukraine, the Museum of Biblical Art in Dallas, the Ukrainian National Museum of Chicago, the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art in Chicago, the Holocaust Memorial Center in Farmington Hills (USA), Hiiallese Church in Odense (Denmark) and other cities around the world.
