Artist’s Biography

Randy Hryhorczuk is an artist based in Whitby, Ontario, specializing in oil painting and linocut printmaking. With over 25 years of experience, Randy creates portraits, abstracts, still life (including pay phones and mall rides), and urban landscapes (featuring billboards and streets) from his art studio. He has participated in community-based arts initiatives, art fairs, and juried art exhibitions both as a participating artist and as part of an organizing team.

As an established artist member with Vibe Arts in Toronto, Randy conducts multi-media art workshops and teaches painting through Station Gallery in Whitby, Ontario. Randy is a collector of Canadian artists’ work, emphasizing the importance of supporting other artists to strengthen the creative community while building vital relationships and influencing others to include original art in their homes.

Visual Art Oil Painting of three sisters on rural farm

Randy’s artwork has been collected throughout Canada, the United States, Great Britain, and Guatemala. He has exhibited his paintings at art galleries and fairs since 2000 in Canada, the United States, and Germany. Randy has also received recognition and awards, including the Silver Award from The Oshawa Art Associations (51st Annual Art Exhibition) at Robert McLaughlin Gallery for his oil painting “Give This to Jack and Alice“, which portrays his baba and her two sisters on their family farm in Manitoba.

I grew up in the wild rural countryside of B.C.’s lower mainland, surrounded by forests and rivers. I explored the woods, playing make-believe among the trees. I skateboarded along lonely roads. My love of comic books, cartoons, and music fuelled my creativity from an early age. In the late 1990s, I rented my first art studio in Vancouver, a small room with a single window in a former ballroom known for its jazz and later, punk rock shows. To access the studio, I had to climb up steep, makeshift stairs and squeeze through a narrow hatch. The small room had only one window, and I had to tack my canvas to the wall, paint, and stretch it outside of the room.

Heartbreak Hotel Toronto - First Artist Studio of Randy HryhorczukStruggling with overcast skies, dampness, and rainy days, I decided to relocate to Ontario and settled in Toronto, where I found a welcoming visual arts community. I stayed at the Backpackers Hostel at King St and Spadina Avenue for a month before moving into an apartment at (formerly) The Heartbreak Hotel on Queen Street West, where I began painting anew.

In 2007, my wife and I decided to seek adventure and relocated to Guatemala City, where I spent my time drawing, painting, reading, and visiting museums. I was fascinated by the towering billboards lining the city streets, and I began creating a body of urban landscape paintings that featured the billboards as my subject. I replaced advertising with words of encouragement, hope, and social commentary.

After returning to Toronto in 2009, I continued exploring unusual subjects such as mall rides, vintage cars, and pay-phones that drew on my fascination with memory and childhood. These everyday objects continue to inspire my work today.

Overall, my art has been influenced by my experiences and surroundings throughout my life. From my childhood adventures in nature to the urban landscapes of cities around the world, my work reflects my ongoing exploration of the world around me.

Oil paintings by Randy Hryhorczuk are available at Canvas Gallery in Toronto Ontario, and online through Saatchi Art and Etsy. Graphic T-Shirt designs are available on Teepublic and Threadless.