Ukraine

Since late February 2022, hearing “Ukraine” come up in conversation or on the news elicits, for many, feelings of deepest compassion and empathy. The war in Ukraine is a war not only against the Ukrainian people but also against their art and culture. Both Russian President Vladimir Putin and a coterie of his sycophants have notoriously stated that there is no such thing as Ukraine, that it is an intrinsic and historically inseparable part of Russia, and that Ukraine must be reincorporated into greater Russia. Invading Russians have plundered innumerable cultural treasures—from Scythian gold dating to the Fourth Century B.C. to masterpiece paintings, sculptures, and religious icons—and have desecrated or destroyed countless more; Western media have reported Ukrainian officials as saying that more than 250 cultural institutions had been damaged or destroyed as of late April 2022.

 Contrary to Russian propaganda, those institutions are part of a rich, unique Ukrainian cultural and artistic heritage that spans millennia. Drawings of mammoths and stags dating to the Paleolithic Period have been uncovered in caves at multiple sites around Ukraine. The Scythians were producing golden masterpieces in the middle of the first millennium B.C. In the Middle Ages, Orthodox Christian religious art gained prominence, with numerous churches and other religiously significant structures being erected around the country. (Many were, sadly, later destroyed by Soviet authorities.) Ukraine’s national literary hero, Taras Shevchenko, who lived during the mid-1800s, was also a painter and engraver by training. And in modern times, since the fall of the Soviet Union, a thriving community of Western-oriented artists has grown and flourished in Ukraine.

 The conflict poses great risks both to those artists and to Ukrainian’s artistic heritage. One Ukrainian artist whose work has been significantly affected is the late Maria Prymachenko, an internationally renowned folk-art painter and ceramicist. Though possibly apocryphal, Pablo Picasso is reported to have said, after visiting a Prymachenko exhibition in Paris, “I bow down before the artistic miracle of this brilliant Ukrainian.” A number of Prymachenko’s works were housed in the Ivankiv Historical and Local History Museum outside of Kyiv. When Russian invaders attacked and burned the museum, at least 25 pieces of her art were destroyed.

 Justice Murals formed partnerships with Kyiv’s Arsenal Museum and the Ukrainian Institute outside Kyiv even before the Russian troops entered Ukraine. One goal of that project was to feature prominently Prymachenko’s works—a goal that has taken on new meaning, as some of those works have now been lost forever. And the partnership with the Arsenal Museum, in Kyiv, is especially poignant now in light of the Museum’s history—the biggest art center in Ukraine, it is housed in a former Soviet munitions factory. This peaceful choice is symbolic of Ukraine, which voluntarily renounced its nuclear weapons in 1996 and wants nothing more than an end to the senseless conflict that Russia has brought upon it.

 A common refrain of Ukrainian artists since the war began is that creating art is helpful in processing their heavy emotions and insurmountable stress. Painter Andriy Roik, from Lviv, told The Guardian that when the war started, his artistic process stopped. But, he said, “At some point, I started to adapt to the war… In my paintings, I have a vision of peace. The peace that I want to see.” By contrast, painter Sergii Radkevych, also based in Lviv, started to create abstract paintings representing the horrors of war. Radkevych stated that he wanted to “show the whole world the violence and the aggression” of the conflict, which he described as genocidal.

 Ukrainians aren’t just fighting for their lives; they’re also fighting to preserve Ukrainian culture. Justice Murals is proud of its role in helping to support that culture through its partnerships with Ukrainian institutions and the awareness that the murals have brought to Ukrainian artists.