The late Ostap Balaban, a founding member of the Ukrainian Institute, was also a passionate collector of art throughout his life. An exhibit of art from his wide-ranging collections will open at the Institute Sunday, March 21st and run through April 17th, 2004. The following article recollects a visit made by UIA board members to Ostap and Ursula Balaban's home shortly before his death in 2002.

To enter Ostan Balaban's world, even casually, was to get a crash course in the history of art. Balaban-- founding member of the Ukrainian Institute of America, community activist, philanthropist-- was that rare breed of private collector: a serious enthusiast who refused to place limits on his tastes or curiosity. For 50 years, that approach was the driving force behind what became a major collection of art-a collection that spanned millennia, cultures and styles.

At their home in a leafy river town north of New York City, Balaban and his wife, Ursula, enjoyed a remarkable setting. Nearly every inch of wall, floor and shelf space had been put to use to display hundreds of paintings, sculptures, ceramics, miniatures, rare furniture. Closets brimmed over with stocked canvases. Whole basement rooms had been turned into galleries. But it was the diversity on display that instantly boggled the visitor's mind: From Minoan vases to Abstract Expressionist paintings, from 17th century Ukrainian icons to American Indian and African ethnographic art, the visitor's eye swept over a richly varied landscape of art that, one suspects, would make any curator proud.

The collecting bug hit Balaban early. One day, on his way to high school in Ternopil, in Western Ukraine, he became enchanted by the work of a street painter. With only a few Polish zlotys is his pocket for school lunch, Balaban impulsively made a bid for the painting, only to be turned down. Undaunted, he saved up enough zlotys over the next few weeks, returned, and got his cherished prize.

After emigrating to the U.S. in the late 40's--during WWII, Balaban was imprisoned for more than a year by the Gestapo for his ties to the Ukrainian underground -- he began collecting in earnest.

His first acquisitions were of works by major Ukrainian painters. Drawn to Ukrainian art by more than just sentiment for the familiar, Balaban saw collecting Ukrainian art as his way of safekeeping it for future generations of Ukrainians. Much of Ukrainian art, he noted, had been plundered throughout Ukraine's turbulent history. "My aim was to collect, to the extent that I could afford it, Ukrainian art for the sake of preserving it in the diaspora so eventually it could be transferred to Ukraine's museums," he said. "The best Ukrainian art always fell into the hands of Russia. Museums in St. Petersburg, Moscow and elsewhere are all full of Ukrainian art that most Ukrainians have never seen-- and not just paintings but also invaluable historical objects."

Though Balaban never completely abandoned collecting Ukrainian art (he continued to be on the lookout for new or undiscovered talent from Ukraine), the great majority of his holdings-numbering some 800 objects-was by non-Ukrainian artists. "Ukrainian art was a start for me," he explained, adding that his frequent visits to galleries and museums in his new homeland had opened his eyes "to the full beauty of a world larger than I had ever known. It was a beauty that spoke directly to me."

His collection includes works by Aleksander Archipenko, Mychailo Andriyenko, David Burliuk, Mykola Butowycz, Oleksander Hryshchenko, Jacques Hnizdovsky, Mikhailo Moroz, Juriy Solovij, Vasyl Krychevsky, Ivan Kurakh and many others. And that's just the Ukrainian artists. Then there are the antique icons, and works by 18th and 19th century American, Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, Polish, and Persian artists. Balaban also delighted in the unexpected, such as intricately inlaid wood chairs from North Africa, an 18th century "blunderbuss" pistol from Spain, or an early American Bible annotated by a cousin of Washington Irving.

Balaban amassed most of his collection in the 50's, 60's and early 70's, before the art market took off and made acquiring better art prohibitive for most private collectors. In those early years, he added the likes of Corot, Rousseau, a couple of small watercolors by Klee, a few Rembrandt etchings, a Pissaro. There's also a painting attributed to Renoir, a small landscape Balaban bought in 1956.

His wife, a gifted embroiderer and ceramist in her own right, was a strong supporter of his passion for art. "To a large extent," the Ukrainian-American newspaper Svoboda once wrote about the Balabans, "the harmony of their married life has been grounded in their inextinguishable love for collecting art."

Showing a visitor around his home, Balaban had a story for every piece he had collected. Nor did he make a secret of his deep emotional bond to the objects on display that went well beyond mere pride of ownership. A serious student of art, Balaban said he seldom bought on the spur of the moment, preferring to study an artist closely before choosing a piece at auction or during the many travels abroad he made in his work as a packaging engineer with major US corporations.

In a characteristic comment on one of his favorite painters, the Ukrainian-born Solovij, Balaban showed a critical appreciation that went against the narrow view or convention. A highly abstract painter, Solovij had had his share of detractors, Balaban noted, but he refused to be swayed by public opinion. "He is very expressive," Balaban said about Solovyj. "He paints religious themes as if he were himself acutely suffering the Biblical events he depicts. He felt them in his soul and expanded on them in his own way, but in an artistic language that showed he was very much a man of his own time. He never tried to copy anyone. That is why I have great respect for him."

Childless, the Balabans often signaled their intent to donate much of their collection to public institutions. Wherever it may end up, it's bound to fascinate. In the long view, what made Balaban's life's passion so special was that his interests went well beyond the expected or ethnocentric. At its heart, his collection is the reflection of a man who had boundless optimism, showed no prejudices, and harbored an enduring love for the creative spirit.

by Roman Czajkowsky

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