New images of well-known classics
The club of illustrators “Pictoric” created a series of unusual posters, “Outstanding writers of Ukraine.” The artists are sure: the stylish works will look in their place both at home, and on the walls of school rooms
Young artists, including Tetiana Tsiupka, Anna Khomenko, Anna Sarvira, Oleh Hryshchenko, Olha Tereshchenko, Olena Staranchuk, Andrii Lesiv, and Romana Romanyshyn, created unusual portraits of classics of Ukrainian literature, well known to everyone from the school program. Lvivites were the first to see these interesting, sometimes unusual works. The exhibit “Outstanding Writers of Ukraine” lasted for several weeks in the Rynok Square. Here one could see the portraits of Ostap Vyshnia, Volodymyr Svidzynsky, Marko Vovchok, Lesia Ukrainka, Mykola Kulish, Taras Shevchenko, Feofan Prokopovych, Vasyl Stus, Mykola Trublaini, Volodymyr Vynnychenko, and many other writers, who were reconsidered and interpreted by the artists in a new way.
“We came up with the idea when we were discussing the proposal of the Publishers’ Forum to make a series of posters within the framework of the project ‘Lviv is the City of Literature.’ It turned out that in Lviv the environment is favorable not only for initiatives connected with literature, but also the kind of art which have become somewhat forgotten these days, the street poster. The exhibit looks very in its place in the Rynok Square. For example, later in Kyiv we tried to organize a similar street exposition, but, unfortunately, it is somewhat harder than we expected: we simply don’t have a public space in the center of the city for such kind of long-lasting and many-time projects. And although we are developing the ‘Writers’ in other formats (making copies of posters and other production), in the prospect we would like to have a possibility to show modern artistic posters dedicated to different topics (for example, we had an idea to make a series about artists) in a city, in the street or in a square, where everyone could see them,” co-curator of the Pictoric project Anastasia Denysenko says. “The response to the event was positive. It is pleasant that people remembered the exhibit and it was not decorative. Actually, namely from people’s response to the project we made sure that these posters may be interesting for schools. Maybe such interpretation of some or other images of authors by an artist will not be close to everyone, but at least we will stop thinking in a stereotyped way, and there won’t be cliches imposed on us.”
Actually, all willing can buy these posters on the website of the cultural-publishing project Chytomo. The administration promises considerable discount to people who will buy them as a present for a school. “The long known images of writers stick in the mind of a child as cliches: Lesia Ukrainka – I Was Laughing Not to Cry, Taras Shevchenko – I Herded Lambs Beyond the Village, Oleksandr Dovzhenko – The Enchanted Desna. Someone has to start breaking these stereotypes. And with the help of an artistic image the process will be faster, more efficient, and more pleasant,” says Oksana Khmeliovska, the editor of the culture-publishing project Chytomo. “But it is too early to speak now about the popularity of the posters, because we have just started to sell them. But the number of letters with a desire to buy posters for schools is much higher than of those who want to buy the works for themselves, therefore we have decided to sell posters for teachers at their cost. We have also agreed about an action for the Diaspora – ‘Buy a poster with a writer – support our army’: we will return only the prime cost, the rest will be transferred for the needs of the army.”
