On a wonderful summer evening, a Spanish rose blossomed in the back courtyard of the Mikhail Bulgakov Museum in Kyiv. Guitars were playing, a woman was singing, and the castanets and heels of dancing girls were beating the rhythm of music, hearts, and inspiration. Grapevines crept up a stone wall, splendid multicolored attire flashed in the evening glow, and you could easily imagine yourself in Seville among high- spirited Spaniards gathered with their friends to sing, dance, and feel the joy of life.
The evening of flamenco was a blend of fleeting instances of beauty, nostalgia for things that have not come true, dreams, memories, and the reflection of a bird’s wing flying over the water.
It is not just music, dancing, or singing; it is a life philosophy and a way of communicating: the singers are speaking to each other, the guitar is arguing with them, and the dancers are telling a story with their hands. Flamenco is always full of strong emotions and spiritual sentiments, usually tragic ones: love and devotion, sorrow, separation, loneliness, and the burden of the everyday routine.
There is a popular joke among flamenco buffs: “If a dancer tries to show that he is able to overcome the force of gravity, this is the classics. If he shows that the force of gravity is drawing him down to earth, this is modernism. But if he shows that he is ready to sacrifice his life in the struggle against gravity, this is flamenco.”
THE FLAMENCO TREE
Who are these people who understand this unusual culture and have embarked on a journey through the unknown territory of the most complicated of the dancing arts? They are members of the Las Guapas Studio of the Kyiv Flamenco School. The program featured the performers Olha Ostroverkh, Olha Sharapa, Svitlana Tkachenko, Maria Kucherova, and the guitarists Pavlo Stepanovych and Pavlo Kosenko, and was entitled Arbol Flamenco, the Flamenco Tree.
They modestly call themselves pupils and have been traveling to Spain for the past five years, where they study the art of flamenco under the guidance of such famous instructors as Juan Polvillo, Araseli Alcala, and others. The Kyiv devotees of flamenco organize master classes, where they teach several levels of students. The artists say that studying flamenco has become one of their most thrilling adventures.
The roots of the flamenco tree are ancient, borrowing elements from various cultures, including Arabic rhythms, Indian sinuousness, and gypsy motifs. Its branches are the various musical and dancing styles of Spain’s regions. The audience in Kyiv got to see four dancing styles as well as the inspiration and powerful persona of each performer.
The singing of Maria Kucherova, Ukraine’s first flamenco vocalist, enchanted the spectators with her refined timbre and harmony. The two guitarists gave a virtuoso solo performance and also accompanied the dancers and singers.
Flamenco is also a theater of masks, the magic of reincarnation. Speaking with the smiling performers after the concert, one could hardly believe that they had just been expressing sadness, severity, and unrequited love with their hands and mimicry.
NOT A STRANGECONVERGENCE
Don Quixote in 1937-1938. He worked intensively in order to absorb his subject, drew up a card index, and even learned Spanish to be able to read the novel in the original. The National Library in Moscow has a Spanish edition of Don Quixote with Bulgakov’s notes. When he was working on the play, he was also writing on The Master and Margarita , and some Bulgakov admirers may be correct in perceiving Don Quixote’s traits in the character of Yeshua Ha-Nozri.
During this period Bulgakov wrote three letters in Spanish to his wife Elena Shilovskaia. “I am writing to you in Spanish, firstly, for you to see how diligently I am studying the king of Spanish writers and, secondly, to check if you have not forgotten...the beautiful language in which Mikhail Cervantes wrote and spoke. He signed his letter, “Your friend Miguel, wounded by the lance of desolation.” The jocular change of names shows the extent to which Bulgakov had penetrated into the inner world of Cervantes as well as the fact that the Master belonged to the universal brotherhood of knights without fear and reproach.
“NEVER TALK TOSTRANGERS”
This sentence opens the novel The Master and Margarita . It is also the name of the museum project that included the flamenco evening. In the latter case, Bulgakov’s words mean a well-known individual in an unusual role. The museum staff invites a variety of well-known people to showcase the new and brilliant sides of their creative talents of which the general public is so far unaware.
Olha Ostroverkh of Las Guapas is known as an art expert, a scenography instructor at Kyiv’s Karpenko-Kary Institute of Theatrical Art, and a research associate at the Les Kurbas Center of Theatrical Art. An important landmark in her creative career is the book she wrote on the stage designer Daniil Lider Theater for Oneself , together with film director Serhii Masloboishchikov. This book, which is in fact a theater, a play, and a portrait, is a profound demonstration of memory, respect and love for Lider.
Ostroverkh’s unique book features a supplement in which the entire list of references is illustrated with graphics, such as pictures, signs, and footnotes. This is the first time that this kind of approach to Lider has been used to spotlight the stage designer’s career from the conception and development of his first ideas to the staging of plays. Quotes from Lider allow the reader to see the height and radiance of his personality and come a bit closer to understanding life and art the way Lider did.
It was a wonderful soiree at the Bulgakov Museum, full of the many discoveries that have come to be expected at the museum on Andriivsky uzviz. The museum is finally being expanded, but this is not at all difficult for those who are familiar with the fifth dimension. As Kyiv reveals its new and friendly facets, the sounds of faraway countries ring out in the little courtyard at the back of the museum.
