On “the national heroism devoid of pathos”

Over the week the Den’s exhibit has been welcoming visitors. Nearly 6,000 people came to the Lavra Gallery in Kyiv to see the country’s major Photobiennale. On the last day the visitors came in an unprecedented amount. In contrast to the elections, the turnout of those who wanted to vote for their favorite was much higher here. And there was a wide range of high quality artworks to choose from – 350 of them in total. The voters of the Audience Award selected the Daddy Goes to War by Anna Chapala. The runners-up were the Tenderness by Ivan Bohdan, and the Military Tan by Bohdan Rosynsky.

“I took this photo past fall in Pisky,” says Bohdan Rosynsky, one of the winners present at the closing ceremony of the exhibition. “There was the group of now famous ‘Boian’ exiting the airport. The photo shows a fighter with the callsign ‘Pheasant.’ I was there as a photo reporter, together with a German colleague. At the time we were on route to the airport. This was my first trip to the ATO zone. And today I know Pisky like the palm of my hand. It happened that I was there many times, and now I have a bunch of stories to tell – both tragic and funny... Certainly, it was a scary job to take photos there, but somebody had to show it. The Military Tan is a part of my project entitled ‘The Faces of the Right Sector.’ The project had been already exhibited at the frontline, and now I think about setting up a personal photo exhibition... The Audience Award at the Den’s Photo Exhibit was a very pleasant surprise. Frankly, I am overwhelmed by the news. Furthermore, this is the first time I take part in any photo contest at all! And then one of my works, the Autumn Landscape was awarded by the Union of Photographers of Ukraine, and now the other – by the visitors! That was a sure way to raise my self-esteem.”

The 17th Den’s International Photo Exhibit has ended in the Lavra Gallery, but its journey through Ukraine only begins. The best photos of the country are traditionally traveling the regions! The next destination is Hlukhiv. Any city, be it large or tiny, can invite the photo exhibition to themselves.

“OUR COUNTRY NEEDS REAL LEADERS WHO WILL CREATE FOR US THE OPPORTUNITY TO UNITE”

Viktoria BARON, designer:

“Every year the Den’s exhibition affects me deeply and emotionally. Our country is not very prosperous, and the whole world today is threatened. Those great people looking at us in pain from the pictures are ready to suffer hardships and misery for the sake of higher ideas – they show the national heroism devoid of any pathos. I am thankful to all the people who see it and feel it; to everyone who wants to find a new path. Every year the Den’s exhibition becomes sharper, and the pictures that reflect prosperous and happy lives diminish in numbers. And this reveals the truth; the life is just like this. The society abandons its pink glasses. In this nightmare we learn how to see joy in things we considered commonplace, in the routine. And this returns us to our human nature. We now understand the real meaning of family, the true values. One of the photos that I liked the most is one close-up of a machine gun and a doll. The latter represents something sacred, the archetype that lives in us. As we are developing as intellectual and cultural entities, we are less able to define these basic things. But when we understand how strong the evil is, it is time to appeal to our archetypal symbols.

“See the faces of politicians who are so far away from us – and this is so noticeable. Three or four years before the war we might have seen it too, but we did not react to that, we took this fact as a given. Today I understand that this is something that should not be. I certainly do not idealize the system of government, neither do I approve of the social difference between classes – but it should not be like it is now. I wish our country to have real leaders, who will create the opportunity to unite around them. For if there are none of them, such reflections lead to nothing.”

“I WAS AMAZED BY THE SCALE OF DEN’S EXHIBITION”

Natalia AFONINA, history teacher at the Yuri Gagarin 134th Secondary School:

“It is not the first time my students and I visit a photo exhibition of newspaper Den. Our school teaches the subject of ‘artistic culture,’ and so it is the exhibition which I want to help the students grasp the concept of beauty. Also, having learned the subject of the current exhibition, I wanted the children to not only hear about what is happening in the east, but also to see the photos taken there. But this is not the end of it. After our visit to the exhibition, we will traditionally hold a roundtable to share our experiences, to discuss on what we saw. Children are now very interested in the history and events that unfold in Ukraine.

“At the present exhibition I saw Ukraine that will not give up. One can clearly see not only struggle, fear, and horror, but also the energy and the faith in the victory of Ukraine. I came here prepared and saw precisely what I was going to see. But I was amazed by the scale of the exhibition. I buy books dedicated to the revolution and to the current events, but this place really shows a lot of photos that are awesomely subtle in transferring emotions. The photographs of crippled soldiers and the pictures of the conditions in which they are located are instantly engraved in one’s memory. Truly, the TV won’t show the true reality, the one I saw here. And I also liked the second hall, where I was able to have a distraction in more positive and bright artworks. Despite the abrupt developments in the country, every exhibited photo is encouraging.”