Igor Kuchinsky; survivor & art dealer (Catherine Dunphy obit)
Hyfler/Rosner
February 22, 2007
Catherine Dunphy
Obituary Writer
Toronto Star
A customer never just bought a painting from art dealer and
gallery owner Igor Kuchinsky. It was never that simple a
transaction. And certainly never that swift a transaction.
The owner of Galerie Heritage, one of Yorkville's oldest art
spots, insisted every potential customer fully appreciate
the art he or she might be thinking of bringing into their
homes. He liked to know his customers, their stories, their
lives. He had to like them before he sold to them.
His gallery was filled with the works of up-and-coming
Russians and Israelis, as well as Canadians. And Kuchinsky
was as much their mentor as their merchant.
He had much to say about his roster of artists, information
he insisted clients hear before making them reaching for a
credit card.
"He loved to explain things," said his son Bob. "He would
talk for hours and a customer had to understand and
appreciate and be enthralled by the story (of the artist) as
well as the creativity (of the art) before he would sell.
Everything had a story and if a customer was not prepared to
listen, they could leave now. "
Few did.
Kuchinsky was old-world courtly and utterly charming, a man
who always wore a silk tie and kissed a lady's hand in
greeting.
"You had to make sure to set aside enough time," said
Joaquin Valdepenas, principal clarinet player with the
Toronto Symphony Orchestra, founder and member of the Amici
Chamber Ensemble and, like many of Kuchinsky's clients, a
customer who became a friend. "It was fun."
On the back of one Russian painting Valdepenas bought from
the gallery is a recipe-sized card on which Kuchinsky wrote
in his elegant European hand a synopsis of the artist's life
and the subject and meaning of the painting. "I treasure
that painting. He personalized it."
What Kuchinsky treasured was the creativity itself. The fact
that it was an act of genesis, birth and also renewal.
As his own life had been.
He was a concert pianist and composer in his native Poland,
and the enthusiastic Montrealer who designed and hosted the
Pavilion of Judaism at Expo 67 and developed programs for
subsequent pavilions at Man and His World.
In Toronto, he was a "European émigré who brought culture to
Toronto when it was in short supply," according to Star
columnist Christopher Hume.
But he also lost almost all of his family along the way. He
was a survivor of five concentration camps, including
Majdanek and Auschwitz, who may have worn those long-sleeve
shirts to cover the number the Nazis etched on the inside
right wrist.
He rarely talked of this time; it didn't suit his sunny view
of life.
"He never talked about the loss of those years," said his
wife, Tatiana. "As a couple, you think you would talk about
the bad times as well as the good times. He would always
switch to the positive."
"He could block out reality and have his own world. He was
the ultimate glass-half-full guy," said his son.
He was liberated from Mauthausen on May 6, 1945, his 37th
birthday. He took that as a sign and, typically, didn't
dwell on the loss of his family, his fledgling musical
career, or the five years he existed without music. Instead
he celebrated his new start in life and used to jokingly
count his age from that time on.
Kuchinsky had been a talent scout for the Moscow Academy of
Arts and Sciences, a former protege of a maestro, pianist
Ignace Paderewski, and on a visit home to Poland when the
Nazis invaded in 1941. His parents were shot on the street,
his brother taken away and never heard from again, and he
was shipped to Majdanek death camp where he became a tailor
because that's what they needed there. At Auschwitz he was
fortunate enough to be in the line that wasn't sent to the
showers. He tuned camp commandant Rudolph Hess's piano. "He
had never tuned a piano in his life, but as a pianist he
figured it out," said his son.
He was among the few survivors of the death march from there
to Mauthausen in Austria, where famed Nazi hunter Simon
Wiesenthal was his bunkmate.
After the war he returned to Poland, where he became a
regional culture minister. He met his wife Tatiana, a
ballerina 15 years his junior, at a dinner party at the home
of her aunt, a noted Polish activist and artist. In 1948
they immigrated to Montreal with daughter Jeannette Aster,
now an opera director based in Europe. Within a month, he
had given his first concert and Tatiana had started a ballet
school.
Kuchinsky joined the Canadian Jewish Council, where he
organized cultural events. He was a natural at Expo,
greeting people at the pavilion, telling them stories,
listening to theirs. It was here that he first connected
with many of the artists he would later represent in
Toronto. He opened Galerie Heritage in 1972, after Tatiana
was hired at Baycrest Centre. The practical one of the
family, she had gone back to school for a social work
degree.
"His soul was dual - music and art," she said. "It made him
richer."
It never made him wealthy. If an artist sold only four
paintings in a show, Kuchinsky would buy the other three.
"He felt badly. He wanted the artist to think the show sold
out," explained his son, who now has more than 300 paintings
his father bought in his basement.
He co-signed loans for their houses. "He was very good to
newcomers," Tatiana said. When the couple used to talk about
their days, he would tell her he had a great day if he had
met interesting people, not if he had sold any art.
After 25 years, he closed the gallery and moved many of his
paintings and tapestries into the antique business his wife
had started up at Harbourfront.
"They were legendary," said their son. Three years ago, they
both moved to King St. W.
Early and avid supporters of the Royal Conservatory of
Music, they had their own seats in the old conservatory
auditorium. On his 80th birthday, his family set up a
scholarship in his name for talented composers - recipients
include Winston Choi in 1994. It is among the
longest-running scholarships, according to Conservatory
employee Daniel Unruh.
"Igor had a great passion for furthering the cause of music
and the arts," said conservatory president Peter Simon.
"We were not rich people but whatever he had, he gave to the
scholarship, even when it wasn't easy for us," said Tatiana.
"He gave from the heart, not from the pocket."
Kuchinsky died Dec. 7 after charming the nurses from his
hospital bed. He was 98, but only in calendar years, not by
his time.