10 Facts About Ivan Padalka

Ivan Ivanovych Padalka was a Ukrainian painter, art professor and author who was executed by the Soviet regime during the Great Terror.

Ivan Padalka was one of eight children born to a farming family of modest means.

Ivan Padalka began his education at the local parish school, where he first displayed a talent for art.

Ivan Padalka's abilities were noticed by a local nobleman, who helped him to finance studies at the State Ceramics Vocational School in Myrhorod, taught by Opanas Slastion.

Ivan Padalka's work was often held up as a model for the class.

Ivan Padalka worked there until 1913, when he was excluded for organizing revolutionary activities.

Ivan Padalka then went to Poltava and found a position at the Ethnographic Museum, where they made copies of Ukrainian carpet designs for a weaving workshop in Kyiv owned by Bogdan Khanenko, who was a major patron of the arts.

Ivan Padalka's earnings enabled him to enroll at the short-lived Kyiv Art School.

Ivan Padalka's works were regularly exhibited there, and he began to illustrate children's books.

Ivan Padalka was posthumously "rehabilitated" in 1958 by the Soviet Government.