The awards for personal contribution to the museum development were handed at Mystetsky Arsenal. The ceremony took place on April 16, dedicated to the birthday of Borys Voznytsky. There were 16 contenders in total (compared to 10, when the prize had been awarded for the first time). The applications came from Dnipropetrovsk, Kyiv, Lviv, Lutsk, and Khmelnytsky. At first, the experts defined the shortlist of three applicants, and then the winner. Apart from Tetiana Sabodash, the winner, the shortlist included Oleksandr Pazhymsky, the initiator and co-founder of several museums, including the Samchyky farmstead museum; as well as the collective of underwater archaeologists and restorers of Khortytsia national heritage site.
Tetiana Sabodash has been working at Olesko castle museum for more than 40 years, and many of these years under the leadership of Borys Voznytsky.
“Voznytsky was our teacher, our ‘foreman.’ He taught us the museum discipline, he was intolerant to carelessness,” reminisces Sabodash. “The people come to Olesko castle and enjoy the opportunity to examine the icons and crucifixes of the 15th and 16th centuries as though as it was something ordinary. Do you imagine what serious struggle it was to keep these things in the museum? Olesko castle was the symbolic ‘first-born’ of Voznytsky, he loved it very much…”
And now the exhibits of the museum feature a refined statuette with the encrypted name of the establishment’s “father” – the award for the prize.
Olesko castle is visited by 100,000 people yearly. A new exhibition hall is to be opened before the Museum day (May 18). The prize money – 20,000 hryvnias – will be spent on air conditioning and curtains for that room. “We will never allow for any harm to come against Olesko castle! We, the museum staff, are not scared by any dirty work with a shovel, if needed. If you want something to be done right, do it yourself,” says Sabodash.
“OUR PURPOSE IS TO SERVE THE PEOPLE”
Borys Voznytsky award is a Ukrainian nongovernmental award, given to people and collectives that contributed much to the development of museums in the country. The award commemorates Borys Voznytsky – the guardian angel of Ukrainian museums. He initiated the creation of many artistic and memorial institutions, including the Museum of Ivan Fedorov and the Museum of Pinzel; he restored castles of Halychyna: in Olesko, Zolochiv, Pidhirtsi, and Svirzh. He was also the chairman of the board of the Mystetsky Arsenal National Art and Culture Museum Complex and launched the Mystetsky Arsenal charity program. In 2012, Voznytsky was tragically killed in a road accident in Zolochiv region near Lviv (a heart attack or a sudden blackout might have been the cause of the accident).
THE STATUETTE PRESENTED TO WINNERS OF THE AWARD IS SHAPED LIKE A COLUMN, FOR ENTHUSIASTIC EXPERTS ARE COLUMNS SUPPORTING UKRAINIAN MUSEUMS
The biennial Borys Voznytsky prize was founded in 2013 by Mystetsky Arsenal and Lviv National Art Gallery. The winner is determined by the Expert council, composed of museum professionals and the community representatives. Larysa Ivshyna, Den/The Day’s editor-in-chief was present among the honored guests. “It was a very aristocratic event. Our elites gathered here, and every contender was worthy of the public’s and journalists’ attention. Ukraine now has a public broadcaster of its own – they should have staged the live broadcast from the award ceremony, in order to make these people recognized by general audience,” says Ivshyna.
“The organizers of the award are doing it essentially for free; their only purpose is to support Ukrainian museums and their staff,” says Larysa Razinkova-Voznytska, Borys Voznytsky’s daughter and the director of Lviv National Art Gallery. “There is practically zero government support for museums, and this prize provides these people with an incentive to keep looking after our heritage. The museum workers are the heroes, who work for very little salary but completely give themselves to the cause.”
There might be periods of pessimism and depression, admits Sabodash: “Sometimes you get the feeling that you need to overcome an impregnable mountain. But we still find the strength to continue working on scientific catalogs, exhibitions, and articles. The people come to us, and that is heartwarming – for them we are ready to work even more and more. Our purpose is to serve the people, to bring them serenity, joy, and confidence.”
Ukrainian museums embrace the realities of today. Maksym Ostapenko, director of Khortytsia national heritage site said, that many of the institution’s staff are volunteers, and some even participate in the fighting in Donbas. The connection between the military heritage of the Cossack era and today is very important to the museum staff of Khortytsia.
“HE WAS EMANATING PEACE AND KINDNESS”
Ivan Marchuk, famous Ukrainian artist, has also visited the award ceremony. Being a classmate of Voznytsky (they attended the college that is now called Ivan Trush Lviv State College of Decorative and Applied Arts), he shared his thoughts to The Day regarding Borys Voznytsky and Ukrainian museums in general.
“When I entered my first year of the college, Borys studied on the second – we were together for four years. The detail I remember the most now is his coat, he always used to come wearing it for classes. He spoke as though caressing with words, he was emanating peace and kindness – though he went through the war and even had some military rank. But at any time he was calm and even melancholic, he was literally ‘the apostle of truth and science.’
“Among the museum workers I know no one like him. We are a deserted country in terms of museums. The museums are only supported by enthusiasts – like Voznytsky. And there are people able to give all their life to museums. But even a little bit of support, like Borys Voznytsky award, is needed in order to recognize their efforts.”
