Painting from the heart

Lviv – The exhibit displayed pictures by 40 vision-impaired authors from Ukraine’s 10 oblasts, the theme of the works being “The Way I Feel the Beauty of the World.” The authors’ ages ranged from 3 to 45. The project was launched by Khrystyna Berehovska, founder of the young people’s art foundation “Fatherland’s Shore.”

“My best childhood friend was a girl who was born blind,” Khrystyna told The Day. “We had not seen each other for many years and accidentally met two years ago. Olena is now a pediatrician, which really shocked me. How can a girl deprived of eyesight live a full life? When we met we talked about many things that concern the vision-impaired. So I, an art researcher, asked her if blind people could paint. The answer was: ‘And how!’ Thus the project’s idea was conceived.”

At first, help came from Oksana Potymko, chair of the Lviv Blind Society, who provided the addresses of all the societies of this kind in Ukraine, and then, the project idea’s author says, all they needed was will. So there were no organizational problems, only financial ones. “But many a little make a nickle,” Khrystyna says laughing.

The painting of every picture was photographed, and the exhibit also displayed a promotional clip “An Exhibit in the Making.” The exposition was set up in a dark space, and each work was lit up with an ultra violet lamp, which created the “effect of radiance.” The opening ceremony was attended by artists from Uzhhorod, Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv and Lviv oblast. The works displayed at the exposition will soon be submitted to the auction “Give the Child a Fairytale.” Why is called so?

“We phoned to a Kirovohrad refuge,” Khrystyna explained, “and a supervisor said that their children had never read a fairytale by themselves because, while there are lots of Braille primers, fairytales are a problem. Incidentally, when we were preparing the exhibit, we found that Kirovohrad oblast accounted for Ukraine’s largest percentage of the blind.”

For this reason, the exhibit organizers will use the auction proceeds to buy fairytales written in Braille for Kirovohrad oblast children. And not only fairytales – the children sent to Lviv presented not only their pictures but also short essays, and adults sent stories of how they lost eyesight. What made the most lasting impression on the project organizers were two stories – from Kirovohrad and Cherkasy. A Kirovohrad boy wrote: “I am very impolite, but my brother is very polite. I beg you, my dear ladies, to send my little brother at least one tangerine for St. Nicholas Day.” A little girl from Cherkasy says in a letter that an Italian family is eager to take her in. “I cannot see Ukraine, but my teacher has instilled in me the love of my Fatherland. Please do not send me to a foreign country – I want to stay at home.”