Browsing: Culture/Arts

TORONTO – Ukrainian Jewish Encounter (UJE), a Canadian charitable non-profit organization, and Ukraine’s NGO “Publishers Forum” (Lviv) announced that “Eternal Calendar” (Vichnyi kalendar) by Vasyl Makhno, published by Ukraine’s Old Lion Publishing House in 2019 is the first winner of Encounter: The Ukrainian-Jewish Literary Prize.

Mr. Makhno was named the winner during the opening ceremony of the 27th Lviv International BookForum on September 16. His book is a panoramic narrative about the lives of Ukrainians, Poles, Jews and Armenians from the 17th century to the present day.

PARSIPPANY, N.J. – Andrij Parekh, a cinematographer and director of Ukrainian and Indian descent, was awarded an Emmy Award for “Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series” on September 20 at the 72nd Primetime Emmy Awards for his directing work on the HBO series “Succession,” particularly his directing of the episode “Hunting.”

In his acceptance speech, Mr. Parekh noted: “I am deeply honored and not the least bit humbled by this award. This distinction has been bestowed on my birthday, so thank you for this charmed gift. I want to thank HBO, and Jesse Armstrong, and Tony Roche, and Adam McKay, and the entire ensemble and cast. The show has been a professional dream, starting as its cinematographer. And now this.”

TORONTO – “Pause in Plight,” a 17-piece art exhibit created by artist Kerri Parnell reveals Canada’s first world war-era national security fears and wartime prejudice, which led to the internment of more than 8,000 men, women and children, primarily of Ukrainian and East European descent, who were deemed “enemy aliens.” The exhibit is on view at the Ukrainian Canadian Art Foundation’s (UCAF) KUMF Gallery through October 11.

The KUMF Gallery hosted an introduction by the artist, via video message, and special remarks at an outdoor commemoration by guest speaker Dr. Lubomyr Luciuk on Sunday, September 13.

NEW YORK – Yara Arts Group and The Ukrainian Museum in New York presents a series of virtual events this fall on world epic song traditions and the work of Zenoviy Shtokalko, who brought the Ukrainian epic songs (dumy) to New York in the 1950s.

“Yara’s Traditional Music: Bandurist Zenoviy Shtokalko” is a four-part series on Shtokalko’s performances of Ukrainian dumy, his instrumental music for the bandura, his development of narrative songs and his modernist writings. Hosted by Julian Kytasty and Virlana Tkacz, the events feature special guests from the United States, Canada and Ukraine. They will be live-streamed in September and October. After their premieres, they can be seen anytime on www.yaraartsgroup.net Yara’s virtual events are all free and bilingual (Ukrainian English).

NEW YORK – Yara Arts Group and the Ukrainian Educational and Cultural Center in Jenkintown, Pa., continue their series of virtual poetry and folk arts events with Yara’s “Traditional Music: Bandurist Zinoviy Shtokalko.”

The event will livestream on July 23 and can be heard afterwards in recording on www.yaraartsgroup.net. Shtokalko, an immigrant from Berezhany, was a virtuoso bandura player who brought the Ukrainian epic song tradition to New York in the 1950s and developed it in the 1960s. Yara’s Virlana Tkacz tells his story, while Julian Kytasty, a master bandura player, shares recordings and plays work influenced by Shtokalko, who died in 1968.

NEW YORK – Yara Arts Group, based in New York, and the Ukrainian Educational and Cultural Center in Jenkintown, Pa., will present a series of virtual poetry and folk arts events, as well as discussions of Yara theater pieces in the coming months.

The planned virtual events will include specials dedicated to the poetry of Oleh Lysheha, a Ukrainian poet whose work inspired several Yara theater pieces. The planned folk arts events will explore the music of Ukrainian immigrants, including Pawlo Humeniuk, who was known in his time as “The King of Ukrainian Music.” Yara is also working on events that will feature the work of American writers of Ukrainian heritage.

KYIV – As an emergency measure to address the country’s health and economic crises, Ukraine’s Ministry of Finance has said it plans to cut funding for all activities of the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy, as well as funding for youth and sports, by 7 billion hrv.

In particular, the revised budget would exclude the planned 750 million hrv for Derzhkino (the government-funded film agency), over 500 million hrv for the construction of the Holodomor and the Revolution of Dignity museums, 250 million hrv for creative unions, 500 million hrv for the Ukrainian Cultural Fund, 150 million hrv for the Book Institute and 500 million hrv for information policy, as well as programs for uniting the country, supporting youth programs and renovation of cultural centers.

FRESNO, Calif. – “Art and War: Donbas, 2014 to the Present,” an exhibition of paintings and drawings by Yulia Gasio, a Fresno State alumna and a faculty member at California State University, Long Beach, opened at the Henry Madden Library’s Leon S. Peters Ellipse Gallery on February 6. The opening ceremony attracted faculty and students from California State University, Fresno, as well as from Fresno Pacific University and Fresno City College, historians, artists, journalists, board members from the Fresno Art Museum, representatives from the Fresno community and Ukrainian organizations from southern California.

NEW YORK – The mid-season concert of the “Music at the Institute” (MATI) series at the Ukrainian Institute of America featured Julian Kytasty and Roman Turovsky performing “Songs From Ancient Ukraine.”

Presented on Saturday, February 1, the evening featured religious and secular musical selections from three periods: the Baroque, the transitional or parallel period, and the kobzar, lirnyk and romanticist period of the 18th-19th centuries.

The ambiance for the evening was set by Roman Turovsky playing “Prelude,” a piece from the Baroque period by Dmytro Tuptalo which he had set for playing on his torban.

NEW YORK – In late December, Yara Arts Group got together with Nova Opera, from Kyiv, and the Koliadnyky, from the Carpathians, to produce “Winter Songs on Mars.” The result was a fun and surprising performance that took place at La MaMa Experimental Theater Company in New York City’s East Village and was directed by Virlana Tkacz, with musical direction by Julian Kytasty.

Setting the traditional Koliada and Vertep nativity play on Mars led to a playful and imaginative show for the audiences. The performance on December 21, 2019, was enjoyed by both the hundreds of students of three Ukrainian studies schools that watched the show in the afternoon, and that evening’s audience, which was a more typical mix of downtown hipsters and the local Ukrainian community members Yara’s shows usually attract.

NEW YORK – Art at the Institute is presenting “Peripheral Visions,” an exhibition of mixed-media artworks by familial artists Iranaeus and Dorian Yurchuk, exploring extreme visions of architectonic and topographic ruminations in two and three dimensions.

The exhibition opens at the Ukrainian Institute of America on Friday, February 21, with an opening reception for the artists at 6-8 p.m. Curated by Walter Hoydysh, Ph.D., director of Art at the Institute, this marks the artists’ first showing with the UIA.

HOLDERNESS, N.H. – Holderness School is hosting “Verses from a Nation in Transition: Photographs by Joseph Sywenkyj” beginning on January 24. Mr. Sywenkyj, a two-time Fulbright scholar and recipient of the prestigious W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography, is an American photographer of Ukrainian descent.

He specializes in documentary, reportage, portraiture and travel photography. Twenty years ago, he began working in Ukraine, the nation of his ancestors.

The exhibit at Holderness School features approximately 50 photographs from three of Mr. Sywenkyj’s long-term projects from Ukraine. For two decades, he focused his lens on health issues related to HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and war trauma.