The house that Mykola built

Mykola Golovan takes great joy from opening up his garden to the public. This place is like no other. Photo: Dorian Jędrasiewicz

It does not take a careful observer to notice that his house is a place where one can learn about the history of art, the history of Golovan’s family, his city and country. Because of these stories, the house has become a place visited by local inhabitants but also tourists. Golovan invites all of them to come in and have a conversation.

Lutsk’s Sagrada Familia

Golovan takes great joy from opening up his garden to the public. This place is like no other. It is full of sculptures of stone animals and people, but one can also see the different kinds of materials that Golovan uses for his various works. I am initially surprised by the eclecticism and untidiness of this place, but also taken aback by its fairy-like atmosphere. It can also be found in the clutter of things in which the artist found unusual enough to keep around. After visitors finish their tour of the house and the garden and talking to their artist himself, they can take the message he provides to the wider world. Many also decide to become a patron of this unique enterprise and leave a donation to support the artist financially. “Leave me your Polish zloty. I will make use of it,” he says to us too. In addition to the Polish zlotys, we donate some Ukrainian hryvnas knowing the sad truth is that this honorary citizen of Lutsk has a very small pension; one that is nearly impossible to live off.

Right behind the house and the garden, which is guarded by a fence, flows the Styr River. We stand on its bank, at the bay that is named after the artist we have just met. The river has been flowing here since Golovan started to build his unusual house; and it will be flowing well after his work is completed. When looking around, we cannot help but think about Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia. We are convinced that this small house in Lutsk too will be a permanent work in progress. Just like the river the house will be constantly changing and meandering. It will not vanish. We can already tell that it will not cease to exist as Golovan spent the best years of his life building it and hopes that after his death his grandchildren and great-grandchildren will continue his life’s work.

In this way, the house becomes the work of multiple generations. It tells the story of a family, a story of endurance against difficult odds, politics and oblivion. Its foundations were set up when Golovan, after completing art studies in Lviv, had returned to Lutsk. He started to live here with his parents. His mother was a seamstress. She was a Polish woman from Volhynia Novgorod. His father was a carpenter from Odesa. It was with his father that Golovan started the work of his life. His father handmade all the doors and windows, Mykola put up the walls, which he later painted and decorated with numerous sculptures and mosaics. The walls present their own narrative. They tell stories inspired by ancient Greece.

From scratch

At one point, the Soviet authorities ordered the house to be demolished. “They took what they wanted. They asked no questions. In exchange, we got a Khrushchyovka (an unofficial name for a type of low-cost apartment from the Soviet Union – editor’s note). But I could not live there. There was no house. No cherry trees, no apple trees, no plum trees. Everything was taken away and it was impossible to get it back. Together with the house, a part of me was confiscated as well. Thus, I decided to save my soul. I started building the house from scratch. On these mires, here near the Styr River. And I am still building it. First, I was building it with my daughter, who does ceramics and is a designer, and my son who was a blacksmith, but also an art lover. Now I am building it with my grandson. My son did not live to see the birth of his son. But his son is helping me build this house of ours, which is also a part of our family history. He will continue my work. Now we have our own place on the earth which we are building. I have many experiences, much to tell, but I do not have that much energy and strength as I had in the past.”

We return to the stone garden and the rubble. The artist shows us his base reliefs. On them we can see portraits of family members. “Look here,” he shows us a relief above a wide door. “I made it 35 years ago. It presents my wife and my children – and me as a strong young man who – like the Greek titan Atlas – holding up his family. I was the pillar of the family.”

Golovan says that his house is an allegory. It presents and is witness not only to the history of one family that has been entangled in Ukraine’s fate, but also the history of Ukraine itself. The artist believes that Ukraine is changing and becoming only more beautiful. It is being built anew, just like he has been building his house anew. It only needs to get rid of some wrongful ideologies and open itself to the world. “I hope that the young generation is looking at the world, becomes inspired by it, is talented and will be also co-creating Ukraine.” Golovan would like Ukraine to become a truly European state.

Multi-culturalism

In Golovan’s art one can find a degree of multi-culturalism. His house is the prime example, which is not that surprising given that the artist’s family was a Polish-Ukrainian mix. There is also clear influence of the multi-cultural Lutsk, a city which is one of the oldest in Ukraine. This multi-ethnic and multi-religious place was once home to Ukrainians, Poles, Jews, Crimean Karaites, Turks and Armenians.

Also characteristically, Golovan’s works make many references to previous epochs and style. Hence, one can see elements of medieval Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, but also modernism. Put together are elements of local and European culture, mythology and Christianity, secular and religious architecture. This eclectic mixing of styles is used by Golvan to go beyond the local history of Volhynia and Ukraine and put them in a broader context of Europe. Speaking about the impact of Ukraine’s culture on Golovan’s work, it is not only his local Lutsk, but also Lviv that provided inspiration. As said earlier Lviv is the city where Golovan studied. There he spent the best years of his life, which has left its mark on him.

As we look at Golovan’s art we will find references to Old Ukrainian tales and images of its coats of arms. The latter he searches for and remodels. In so doing, Golovan shows that he is not only inspired by the greatest works of European art, but also explores man’s spiritual development.

In Soviet times, he admits, it was a form of rebellion. At that time making sculptures presenting the Apostles was forbidden. And yet Golovan made a small Vatican in his garden. In this way, he was expressing his opposition to the Sovietisation of Lutsk and to imposing ideology by force. He disdained atheism and nationalism. “I was always combining different styles of artistic expression to create something new. First I create things in my mind, then I transfer ideas into paper, and finally into sandstones or rock blocks.”

Work is pleasure

Clearly, the latter are not his only materials. Golovan’s garden is also home to many decorations made of glass and other things which Golovan systematically recycles. He gets out of these materials what others cannot see in them. It is a never-ending process; creation and re-creation and gives him the energy to endure. Just like the river which flows in front of his house.

“When a man has experienced so much in life as I have, in old age he becomes silent. I will not take these things with me, but I can pass them forward so that young people can get inspired by my experiences. And learn from history’s mistakes. Thanks to the people who come and visit me, the tourists that arrive here, I can see the world and how it is changing. I would like to see Ukraine change like this. I have no doubts that my grandchildren will continue to hammer the rock which I was hammering and so was my son. To shape our family and our country.”

We look around Golovan’s garden, petting his red-hair cat, when our eyes find a Latin inscription on the door. It reads: “work is pleasure”. Could there be a better ending to our visit of this exhibit? Golovan life’s meaning is his work, which thanks to a talent that – as he says – he had inherited from his parents and wants to pass forward to the next generations and has allowed him to tell the story of his family, of Lutsk, Volhynia and Ukraine.

Translated by Iwona Reichardt

Kinga Anna Gajda is an assistant professor at the Institute of European Studies of the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. She holds a PhD in literature.

Art, Lutsk, Ukraine