Andrew Manaylo
"CÔTE D'AZUR" art series
unique art for your collection
“The impressions gained from my stay on the French-Italian Riviera are embodied in series of paintings, which I have named "Côte d'Azur".
A couple of years ago, after acquiring a studio in Sanremo (Italy), there came a point in my life when I became passionately involved in creative research: trying to move away from the limiting frames of realism to a freer, non-figurative form, in order to more deeply convey the beauty of the world around us. Now I strive not to directly reflect what I like and why, but to convey the very feeling of joy that appears in the soul from what I see - that feeling that arises from purely personal experience, the path to which we all have an individual, but the result is often similar.
I hope I managed to convey those colors, that life-affirming lightness, that elegant and exciting diversity - which create the aura of the Cote d'Azur!”
Andrew Manaylo
“...The main feature of Andrew Manaylo's artworks is their vitality, the bundle of vital energy and force, the spontaneity of their temperament. This is something that is given to an artist from above. It is a gift that will always find the possibility to reveal itself independently of the language it chooses.”
Virginia Bazzechi Ganucci Cancellieri,
Art critic, Florence, Italy
AS FEATURED AT
Sea, Sunlight, Rapture
The experience gained during the months spent on the French-Italian Riviera is condensed in Andrew Manaylo's latest series of paintings to which he has given the title Côte d'Azur.
A more expressive title for this extraordinary series containing fifteen different pieces could have been hardly found by the painter who, as a result of his study trips to Italy, France and North America at around his fiftieth birthday, moved from the figurative way of painting to his new style representing feelings, emotions, moods and desires in an expressionist way. We are witnessing the formation of a new stage in the process of his creative development.
In the works of the artist who proudly proclaims his Subcarpathian Rusyn roots together with his love to Hungary he had chosen to be his new homeland some thirty years ago, and in his eternal affinity with the sunny Mediterranean scenery we can undeniably detect primarily the influence of the masters who taught him at the academies in Uzhgorod, Lviv and St. Petersburg, and also the affinity of the artist's father and grandfather, who were also painters, with the artistic topics connected with the scenery and people of the southern slopes of the Carpathians.
Initially, he gave preference to reflecting the beauty and joy of life, which - without prejudgment - manifested itself primarily in the portrayal of women.
Two years ago, after having acquired the studio in San Remo, in his life came the point when he embarked passionately on an artistic research: trying to move away from the limiting boundaries of realism to a freer non-figurative form, in order to convey the beauty of the world around us deeper. Now he seeks not for a direct reflection of what he likes and why, but to convey the very feeling of joy that arises in the soul from what he saw, which is a feeling arising from purely personal experience, the path to which is individual for all of us, but the result is often similar.
Andrew Manaylo admits that the Mediterranean inspires him everywhere and every minute with its crystal clear, vibrating and refreshing sea water, sunshine caressing the soul and colors, smells and sounds typical only for the Mediterranean.
If we close our eyes and imagine the Cote d'Azur, the French-Italian Riviera, the Mediterranean fairy-tale world of San Remo and try to feel the sweetness of this wonderful life (dolce vita), and then suddenly opening them we will look at the paintings of the Côte d'Azur series, then the first thought that comes up: "Oh, yes!" - it really is That feeling!
Indeed, these colors, this life-affirming lightness, this elegant and exciting diversity, embody the world of the Cote d'Azur! Embody today the same way as before. In the artist's works, this endlessness of time is associated with rhythmically repetitive voluminous pearls. Countless shades of blue represent the very cradle of life - an ocean full of energy, the waves of which are also constantly breaking against rocks, or pulsating across the sand - like an eternity of time, which is finite only for mortals. Or endless - as many of us believe.
Painted on aluminum panels, Andrew Manaylo's paintings seem endless (that's why he doesn't frame them). Rather, they are fragments of the life around us, placed in a gloria of subdued light.
This is how these works, floating at a distance from the wall and in a glow of light, were born. The undeniable success of the series "Côte d'Azur" reflecting the Mediterranean feel of life is expressed at least by the fact that many of these works have already been presented in the galleries of Nice and Monaco, or are in the possession of collectors and patrons.
Laszlo Bertok,
Art writer, Hungary
“Andrew’s work is so expressive and skillfully composed, there is no wonder that he is garnering much interest and that his pictures are already in museum collections.
In all my years as a curator and collector, I have rarely come across an artist of his caliber.”