At the invitation of the Embassy of Ukraine in France and with the assistance of the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine, a delegation including Maryna Hrymych, member of the National Union of Writers of Ukraine, Doctor of History, professor of Kyiv-based Taras Shevchenko National University; Nina Saienko, Merited Worker of Art of Ukraine, member of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine; Lesia Maidanets-Saienko, artist, Ph.D. in Art, associated professor at the Boichuk Institute of Decorative Art and Design; Anton Kushnir, writer, translator, journalist; Irena Karpa, writer and singer, arrived in Paris.
Within the framework of Shevchenko Days at the Ukrainian Cultural and Information Center at the Embassy of Ukraine in France the launches of books, My Shevchenko by Maryna Hrymych, Liubko Deresh, Yevhenia Kononenko, Andrii Kurkov, and Yurii Makarov (Kyiv, Nora-Druk); Oleksandr Saienko’s Shevchenkiana by Nina Saienko (Kharkiv, NTMT); and a series of placards Shevchenko in Maidan, which were presented by Anton Kushnir and Irena Karpa. The audience (including the head of Ukrainian Language Department Iryna Dmytryshyn and students of the Institute of Oriental Languages) took great interest in the narration about the way Kobzar’s ideas of love to freedom are perceived in present-day Ukraine.
The launches of books and placards took place at the art exhibit “Breath from Ukraine,” where the tapestries (Osenytsia, Poplars live in me, Winterless South, Autumn, Midsummer Day Fires), carpets (Amulets, On the Crossroad, Bluish Tint), batik works (The Milky Way, An Angel, The Feast of Maccabacus), and straw mosaic (Dawn) by Nina Saienko and Lesia Maidanets, as well as replicas of works by Oleksandr Saienko which were used as illustrations in the book Oleksandr Saienko’s Shevchenkiana.
“The exposition of carpets in Ukrainian Culture Center in Paris became a revelation for many admirers of Ukrainian decorative art. This is a school of high artistic mastery, mystery of a moment in a refined form of compositions, tender palette of many colors, rhythms, etched in time and space. This is extremely poetic and exquisite,” underlined Veronika HOPKO-PEREVERZIEVA, theater critic, diploma winner of Sorbonne University, Paris.
The meeting with intellectuals and audience, organized by the Ukrainian Literary Club (head: Oksana Mizerak) and Symon Petliura Ukrainian Library (director: Prof. Yaroslava Yosypyshyn) was rich in content. During the launch of Oleksandr Saienko’s Shevchenkiana many questions arose as for the creative realization of an artist in a totalitarian system, creation and activity of Oleksandr Saienko Art Memorial Museum in Borznia, Chernihiv oblast. After the meeting Yaroslava Yosypyshyn told the story of creation of Symon Petliura library and museum, showed the items that are stored in the museum.
A model lesson for students of 9-11 forms, Oleksandr Saienko’s Shevchenkiana, was held at the Ukrainian Art School in Paris. The children discovered the art world of Oleksandr Saienko, a Ukrainian artist of world renown, who dedicated his works to the national genius of Kobzar.
We had an opportunity to visit a small town of Senlis, where the Ukrainian church, purchased by the community, was opened. It is located not far from the place where the church built by Anna of Kyiv in the 11th century used to stand. After the Pontifical Divine Liturgy was served before the public, which gathered for the opening ceremony, Ukraine’s Ambassador to France Oleh Shamshur delivered a speech. Later the flowers were laid to the monuments to Anna of Kyiv and Holodomor victims.
