The Paint an Easter Egg School has been reopened in Ternopil on the eve of Easter. The Young Prosvita NGO launched Easter egg painting workshops in Ternopil a decade ago, and art studio Gifts has joined this initiative lately.
“We hold classes in Easter egg painting and handmade art. The latter involves candle-making and coloring Easter napkins. Overall, we meet for five days a week, with classes lasting one and a half hours per day,” the Easter egg painting school’s co-organizer Anastasia Lisovska told us.
“We are forming small groups this time, to enable us to work with each student. The group I am leading at the moment has 13 people. The age of the workshop’s participants ranges from 6 to 30 years. As usual, we teach a technique that we have offered for many years; it is the beeswax technique that is suitable for the classroom conditions. We try to inform people during every meeting about meanings of the Easter egg and symbols we paint on them. It is part of the Easter basket and an artwork now, but it once had magical significance as well. It served as a talisman and was used in some very interesting rituals. After this theoretical introduction, we go directly to learning the technique and practicing the art,” the Easter egg painting school teacher Maria Shaplai said.
Experts say that mastering the Easter egg painting technique is not that hard, but talent and creative inspiration are required all the same. “Most importantly, you have to want to learn it. Six-year-olds create Easter eggs of their own, and while lacking in workmanship, they are very beautiful and unconventional. Color combinations make up for some highly individual and interesting works,” Shaplai said.
