KHMELNYTSKY OBLAST — A roll of fabric is like a Tree of Life. In placing their cross stitches on cloth, skilled female embroiderers express their views of the special features of their native village and convey them from community to community. “As the folk saying goes, every courtyard has its own traditional beliefs. But history is the same for everybody,” says Volodymyr Kobera, chairman of the Bili Hory district administration, meaning that rushnyks (embroidered runners) never repeat the same patterns.
“There are 25 territorial communities. Therefore, there will be the same number of patterns on the 22.5-m-long rushnyk,” Kobera said. “Our district turns 85 on March 7, 2008. So in preparation for this event, we decided, among other things, to embroider a rushnyk. This will be both a talisman and a symbol that unites peoples’ souls and the past, present, and future. This is why they call the rushnyk‘a talisman of human destiny in the Bili Hory area.”
The work was begun in Yampil and continued in Denysivka, Stavyshchany, Yosypivtsi, and Semenove. The villagers first discuss what they would like to see on the rushnyk and only then entrust the work to the most renowned embroiderers. They immediately agreed about the embroidery technique: only cross stitches, not satin-stitches, “because everyone carries their own cross,” they explain.
Olha Fedunets says that everybody in her native Sushivtsi knows how to embroider, because they inherited this skill from their ancestors. “No matter whose house you enter, you will see icons decorated with rushnyks. In our family this custom has been handed down from generation to generation. I even sewed my own trousseau,” she said.
Fedunets says that the dominant colors are blue and yellow, the symbols of our independent state, while red symbolizes love. She did not forget the colors and hues of faith, hope, and bounty. She talks about the lines of embroidery into which she instilled a special but generally well- known sense: “To live in harmony with people and nature.” The rushnyk also serves a sacred and ritualistic purpose, not decorative.
Antonina Shaplai, a pensioner living in Yampil, embroidered the eternal Tree of Life. The rushnyk shows virgin green meadows. Beneath them lies a historical layer of the Trypillian culture. “May it not become overgrown with the weeds of oblivion,” she declared while embroidering the section of cloth that also depicts the old Tykhomil chapel, the village’s emblem.
Ornament is inherited, but technique is acquired. Word has it that there is a pond, a mill, and a little green garden in Myklashi — and white swans in the pond. So Nadia Melnyk reproduced this characteristic feature of her native village on her piece of cloth. “The swans show their loyalty to our village; they are an example for everyone. Of course, people become inspired and then follow suit,” Melnyk said.
In the picturesque village of Yosypivtsi is a very old linden tree. No one knows who planted it, or when. Local residents think that the linden is the village protectress. In Yurivka there is a spring. No one doubts that this is a holy spring. If the elderly feel sick, they come to this spring to be healed. The spring is depicted on a section of cloth by two female embroiderers, Inna Prysiazhniuk and Olha Kovalska.
The village of Pohoriltsi is distinguished by asters that grow next to every fence as well as by storks. But these birds are “lazy.” All they do is tirelessly improve the demographic situation. This is why a kindergarten has been opened in Pohoriltsi.
Girls and women do their share of embroidering and hand the roll of cloth over to neighboring communities waiting patiently for their turn, pondering how their villages can dazzle the world. They eventually figure out how to do this. The village of Kornytsia is located near the Horyn River, bordering Dvirets, in Iziaslav district. Between Kornytsia and Dvirets is a valley popularly known as Monastyryshche. Word has it that work on the Peresopnytsia Gospel began here at Holy Trinity Church on Aug. 15, 1556. Local embroiderers are now thinking about how they can best reproduce this historic event on their section of cloth.
It is expected that the longest rushnyk in Ukraine, stitched by all territorial communities, will be handed over to the raion historical and ethnographic museum.
