Ivan Keivan was a Ukrainian artist, graphic designer, and art historian. He was born Vasyl' Lepykash on September 16, 1907, in the village of Karliv, Sniatyn region, Galicia (now in Ivano-Frankivs'k oblast, Ukraine). He completed his gimnasium education in Kolomyia and began his artistic studies at the O. Novakivs'ky school in Lviv (1927-28), and continued his studies at art academies in Krakow and Warsaw, specializing in graphic arts and also studying art history. While in Warsaw, he was a member of the "Spokii" art group and exhibited his works starting from 1933. He completed his studies in Warsaw in June 1937, and in the same year passed his pedagogical exam, qualifying him to teach art in schools. From 1937, he was a member of the Asotsiatiia nezalezhnykh ukrains'kykh mysttsiv (Association of Independent Ukrainian Artists) in Lжviv, and from 1941 to 1944, a member of the Union of Ukrainian Artists. During this time, he taught at a Ukrainian gіmnasium and industrial arts school in Kolomyia, where in 1943, he married the physician Maria Adriana Krupska.

In March 1944, he and his wife became refugees. While in displaced persons camps in Bayreuth, Füssen, and Mittenwald, he taught painting in gimnasiums and created paintings and graphic work. He created a series of Austrian landscapes and portraits in various media. He was a member of the Ukrains'ka spilka obrazotvorchykh mysttsiv (Ukrainian Association of Artists) in Germany and participated in all of its exhibitions in Munich, Regensburg, Mittenwald, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, as well as exhibitions in Germany, Paris, and Amsterdam. His works, especially his engravings, were highly successful, including his designs for stamps of the "Scout Post" of the Ukrainian scouting organization PLAST.

He arrived in Canada with his wife and two children, son Orest and daughter Zonia, in December 1949. They settled in Edmonton and Keivan actively participated in artistic life. His works were exhibited in Edmonton, Saskatoon, Winnipeg, Toronto, Montreal, New York, and Detroit with notable successes – he received several first prizes, two second prizes, and one special prize for the tempera "Cliff" in 1956 in Edmonton.

Together with artists B. Stebelsky and M. Dmytrenko, he was a co-founder of the Ukrainain Association of Artists in Canada, served as its president for one term, and was vice president for most of the remaining time. For the Mazepa commemorations in 1959, he engraved a composition portrait of Ivan Mazepa, and in 1961, two oil portraits of a youthful Taras Shevchenko were commissioned by the Ukrainian Canadian Congress and the Shevchenko Scientific Society. These portraits were gifted to university libraries in Vancouver and Edmonton.

Beginning in the 1950s, Ivan Keivan emerged as an art critic and art historian. He authored numerous articles in the Ukrainian press in Canada and the USA, as well as monographs such as "Volodymyr Sichynsky" and "Dmytro Antonovych - tvorets' ukrains'koho natsional'noho styliu", as well as the still-unpublished unpublished work "Dmytro Antonovych". His most significant work in this field is "Taras Shevchenko - obrazotvorchyi mystets'", for which he received the Shevchenko Medal from the Ukrainian Canadian Congress in 1964. In 1962, he began work on a history of Ukrainian art. This colossal work has not yet found a publisher due to the enormous publication costs.

For his art historical work, Patriarch Josyf Slipyi appointed him a professor at the Ukrainian Catholic University in Rome in October 1966. Unfortunately, by the time the university was organized, Ivan Keivan lost his hearing, making it impossible for him to fulfill his professorial duties.

In 1976, the Shevchenko Scientific Society named Ivan Keivan a full member of its history section. In 1979, the Western Canada branch of the Shevchenko Scientific Society organized a celebration of his 50th anniversary of his work as an artist and 25 years of scholarly work, which included an exhibition of his artworks. Ivan Keivan passed away in Edmonton on September 18, 1992.