He was born and spent his childhood in the picturesque surroundings of Izium, a city in the historical region of Sloboda Ukraine, and today's Kharkiv Oblast.

Upon graduation in 1885 he traveled to Europe and North Africa on a scholarship from the Academy, painting places he visited from Spain to Germany and Egypt.

[2] The paintings reflected the influence of the Barbizon School's panoramic depiction of space, the sky and the silvery atmosphere of "Pierre Corot".

The sky and the unbounded steppes, veiled in lily-blue fog, and wet grass and humid air, change colors gradually.

Painters such as Serhiy Vasylkivsky and Oleksandr Murashko introduced new subjects, new approaches, new visions and new techniques to keep abreast with the latest developments in European painting of those times.

[4] Vasylkivsky left behind almost 3,000 works of realist and impressionist art,[1] sketches, drawings, a great number of which were lost during World War II.

He was the first, after Taras Shevchenko, to draw upon subject matter from Ukraine's past and completed a number of works on historical and ethnographic themes.

[2] Vasylkivsky created three large panels for the Poltava Zemstvo (Provincial Land Administration) building which was designed by the Ukrainian architect Vasyl Krychevsky: The Chumak Road to Romodan, Election of Pushkar, The Duel of Cossack Holota with a Tatar.