City of Childhood

The Irene Gallery hosts Vita Rudneva’s first personal exhibit. The artist called it My City. Meaning Kyiv, of course, the more so that now and then it is stated directly with graphic clarity referring to the Podil or Andriyivsky uzviz. Yet this Kyiv is extremely subjective; moreover, it is lost forever. And the crux of the matter is not all those houses and dovecotes presently torn down, but the artist’s own impressions and reminiscences, now only in her memories and dreams. Vita Rudneva’s is the city of her childhood or in any case a city from some long bygone past, which makes it all the more painfully beautiful and which becomes increasingly illusive even to the artist herself.

Vita Rudneva’s Kyiv is small patios with their little secrets, wrought-iron gates hanging askew, old trees, dovecotes, rooftops, and clouds. Everything is so remarkably quiet, even on the “Crossroads.” Probably this is because it is almost always an early morning seldom followed by the evening, and then it is a “Quiet Evening” with no busy days of hustle and bustle. As for nights, it is the time of miracles and ghostlike musicians are the only ones allowed to disturb the city’s impenetrable silence with their violins and cellos (“Midnight Quartet”).