On July 8, The Day published a report about a conference of readers in Pryluky dedicated to our Ukraine Incognita book. Recall that it was organized by the Yakovchenko National and Cultural Initiatives Fund on its own initiative. For us, this action was extremely gratifying and simultaneously unexpected, being another successful refutation of stereotypes about Ukrainian culture in the provinces. This was further confirmed at our meeting with the fund’s founders, its head Larysa MILOVA (left in photo), Ihor PAVLIUCHENKO, and Lesia KOSHEL, who visited The Day last week.
The fund’s major goal is to study and popularize the creative heritage of the man whose name it bears. Brilliant comic actor, Pryluky-born Mykola Yakovchenko is well known in Kyiv as well. Here he worked at the Ivan Franko Ukrainian Drama Theater, becoming an idol for capital theatergoers in the 1950s-1960s. A monument to the actor was erected in the square near the theater on his centennial. However, in Pryluky until recently not many people were aware of their famous compatriot, as Ihor Pavliuchenko explained. Thus, an idea occurred to the fund’s founders to establish a Mykola’s House cultural center in Pryluky, which would combine a movie theater with a small stage, a literary coffee house, and memorial museum. In addition, they plan to publish Mykola Yakovchenko’s biography, which would become the fund’s calling card, and to introduce a series of mini-lectures on him in Pryluky schools, so that their graduates came to, say, Kyiv possessing “a feeling pride in their small motherland.” The fund itself was created to gather donations for various other cultural events in Pryluky (incidentally, its organizers stress that they are in no way guided by mercantile interest; their strivings are connected with their idealistic world view). The whole project is designed for the long term; the local authorities have promised the fund official support for ten years. In addition to popularizing Mykhailo Yakovchenko’s work, the fund intends to “raise the cultural level of Pryluky residents in general,” by organizing theater tours, contests, etc. The Day’s editor-in-chief Larysa Ivshyna and the fund’s founders have already agreed that The Day’s next photo exhibition will come to Pryluky (fund representatives especially insisted that it would represent Volodymyr Kharchenko’s photo of the Yakovchenko monument on the eve of its being installed).
The guests told us a wonderful story. During the readers’ conference in Pryluky, manager of the local children’s library Olha Lukash mentioned that they didn’t have a copy of Ukraine Incognita. After the report of the conference was published in our newspaper, a copy of the book suddenly came to the library, sent by our reader from Kharkiv who had already finished reading it. Larysa Ivshyna called this further disproof of the stereotype of our compatriots’ passivity and lack of initiative, at least when it comes to our readers.
PS. Those willing to support the Yakovchenko National and Cultural Initiatives Fund (by either seeking materials on the actor’s life and work or by financing its projects) should call +38 (04637) 3-2289 or send email to: [email protected]
