As a child, Novakivsky spent hours in church sketching icons and studying the baroque-Byzantine monuments of sacred art. The artist grew up in the richness of folk customs and folklore. While studying in the workshop of Pylyp Klymenko, Novakivskyi had already worked on an iconostasis in the village of Kubantsi. But this work did not appeal to the young artist: he painted seascapes with greater inspiration, using paints scraped from the palette. Not a single work from those years has survived.
During his studies in Kraków and internship at Wyczółkowski, Novakivskyi created hundreds of Impressionist landscapes, seeking to convey fleeting sensations and states of mind through sketch-like brushstrokes and shifting light effects. These works often carried symbolic or allegorical undertones. In Kraków, he became closely connected with the Ukrainian intelligentsia surrounding writer Bohdan Lepkyi, among them Vasyl Stefanyk, Osyp Kurylas, Modest Sosenko, Ivan Trush, and Viacheslav Lypynskyi. They got together at Lepkyi’s apartment to discuss national politics and issues of art.
At his solo exhibition in Kraków in 1911, Novakivskyi presented over 100 works, gaining popularity and recognition. His art drew the attention of Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytskyi, who invited him to Lviv. After moving there, Novakivskyi combined his creative practice with teaching. In 1923, he founded an art school in Lviv, which became a key center of painting culture in Western Ukraine. In 1924–1925, he also served as the head of the Faculty of Art at the clandestine Ukrainian University in Lviv.
Novakivsky’s favorite model for portraits and allegorical compositions was his beloved wife, Anna-Maria. The artist often painted himself as well, producing numerous oil self-portraits and sketches in pen, pencil, and charcoal. These works recorded his psychological states and artistic positions at different stages of his life. In many of those works, he is depicted looking back over his shoulder — as if reproaching a society indifferent to art and its creators.
A special place in his work was occupied by St. George’s Hill in Lviv, visible from his studio. The artist painted countless landscapes with the Cathedral of St. George, the residence of his spiritual guide, Metropolitan Sheptytskyi.
Novakivskyi’s final work — the unfinished icon The Madonna of St. George’s Cathedral — was intended for St. George’s Archcathedral. Though incomplete, it stands as a summation of his artistic exploration of Marian themes.
In 1972, the Oleksa Novakivskyi Art and Memorial Museum was opened in Lviv. In 2016, Slovak professor Mykola Mushynka donated 50 of the artist’s paintings and drawings to the Andrey Sheptytsky National Museum in Lviv. In 2022, due to the 150th anniversary of Novakivsky’s birth and the 50th anniversary of the museum, Ukrposhta issued a commemorative envelope featuring the museum building and a stamp with Novakivsky’s Self-Portrait with a Brush.