Truskavets is a water resort located 80 kilometers from Lviv, at the foot of the Eastern Carpathians. The first mention of the therapeutic properties of local water dates back to the end of the 16th century, when the royal physician Wojciech Oczk noted in his memoirs that oil was extracted in Truskavets, and the water accompanying it was used by peasants as a cure for many ailments.
The history of this area resembles the history of the entire Galician region. In terms of territorial affiliation Truskavets survived the Austro-Hungarian, Polish and Soviet periods. This inconstancy has imprinted on the architecture of the city: there is no one style, and some buildings are very original.Noting the sights of Truskavets, we can’t help mentioning the villa «Gopliana» built in 1928, located on Kobzar Square, 3. It is made in folk Polish or Zakopane style, extremely popular at that time in Poland. This style, based on the traditional architecture of Carpathian masters, was followed in the construction of many masterpieces of wooden construction in the Zakopane ski resort and in Warsaw. Villa «Gopliana» has seen many famous persons. In the 30s of the twentieth century it hosted the U.S. Ambassador to Poland, the Estonian and Turkish presidents and many other distinguished guests. In 1929, a natural history museum with a rich collection of exhibits was opened in the villa, which was plundered and practically destroyed during the Soviet regime. And since 1992 the unique in its kind Museum of the People’s Artist of Ukraine Mykhailo Bilas has been located here.
The rustic three-storied house, which is decorated with carved details of ornaments, is the most beautiful building in the city — attracts the attention of tourists who came to holiday in Truskavets. And the house-museum differs not only by its peculiar appearance: its uniqueness is that it was opened during the lifetime of the folk master. Mikhail Bilas still lives and works in the city, and the exhibits of the museum come here not from the storage, but from the artist’s studio. The museum exhibits tapestries, carpets, panels, tablecloths, appliqués, napkins, rushniki and bedspreads — all in a single copy. Weaver, painter, embroiderer, graphic artist — Mikhail Bilas is a folk master, who for many years studied the ornaments of Hutsul embroideries and scribbles, their signs and codes. Through comprehended symbolism and color the maestro reveals the psychology of the peoples living in the Carpathian region: Hutsuls, Boyks and Lemks. The creative property of the artist consists of more than four hundred works made by his own hands. The artist’s name is known on all continents, it is recorded in more than a hundred editions and publications in many languages of the world. Visitors to the museum are immersed in a wonderful world of forms and compositions, in an unearthly feeling of uplift, warmth and are spiritually saturated with the riches of color of the folk source.
If you will be on vacation in the Carpathians or in Lvovskaya region, be sure to visit Truskavets, where there are bright sights of Ukraine: folk master Mikhail Bilas, whose lifetime museum is located in a fabulous terem — a building-monument of architecture and history villa «Goplyana».