UKRAINE-CRISIS/STREET ART Street artists in Kiev draw inspiration from conflict in the east

Record ID: 146135

  • Title: UKRAINE-CRISIS/STREET ART Street artists in Kiev draw inspiration from conflict in the east
  • Date: 23rd July 2015
  • Summary: KIEV, UKRAINE (RECENT) (REUTERS) ***WARNING CONTAINS FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY*** PORTRAIT OF UKRAINIAN POET, LESYA UKRAINKA, ON WALL OF APARTMENT BUILDING AUSTRALIAN ARTIST, GUIDO VAN HELTEN, POURING PAINT IN BUCKET HELTEN THINNING DOWN PAINT IN BUCKET HELTEN TAKING BOX AND PAINT CANS, GETTING INTO CRANE PLATFORM HELTEN FIXING BELT HELTEN RISING ON CRANE ALONG WALL WITH PORTRAIT
  • Embargoed: 7th August 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Ukraine
  • Country: Ukraine
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVAC013SKVAG3AHQUXSHSI1W1UOD
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Young Australian artist Guido van Helten, who has made his name around the world turning the buildings into enormous portraits, reclaimed Kiev's wall with massive portrait of Ukrainian poet Lesya Ukrainka at the city centre.
    Helten rode up a construction lift to be eye-to-eye with canvas on an old, six-story high wall. With his can of spray paint, he created an image of a woman's face and her Ukrainian traditional dress with embroidery. Despite normally working in black and white, the artist decided to enrich the tones by adding some colour.
    "Firstly, I was just interested in the textual patterns on the Ukrainian dress, so…And then my friend was telling me about her [Ukrainian poet Lesya Ukrainka], what she stands for. I thought that was a nice story and now I since found out that she used to live across the street here, so it's very perfect," he said.
    Huge space in mural is devoted to lilies of the valley which was the name of the first published poem by Lesya Ukrainka.
    As a contemporary street artist, Helten paints deeply nostalgic pieces. He used his phone to create the initial sketch of a delicate vintage portrait of Ukrainian poet, who became famous for her contribution to Ukrainian literature and for her participation in national liberation movement in Ukraine at the end of 19th century.
    The project is curated by CityArt project and its founder Geo Leros, with the idea of creating a block of street art in Kiev. Helten was offered a free place to stay and materials in exchange for a painting. All costs were covered by Ukrainian businessman.
    "He is doing this for free. He makes a gift for the city. He would like to paint what he wants, what he feels knowing the history of the city, knowing the situation that was in the country. He appreciated the story and paints exactly this," Leros said.
    28-year-old Helten grew up in Melbourne and started his career with tagging trains with his friends, eventually being arrested in Australia five times for his graffiti. He went to university in Brisbane, where he studied visual art and experimented with watercolours. Helten has painted his way across Australia to London, Scotland and Iceland.
    World-renowned Ukrainian mural artists Interesni Kazki invested their own money and supported the project with two giant patriotic murals in the city center.
    In a mural called "Ukrainian St. George" a Ukrainian kosack with the head of a falcon hacks at a snake.
    "I probably liked it. I more liked it than not, because it very symbolically shows current state of our country, I think so. At least, that's how I saw it and perceived it," Kiev resident Svetlana Belyavskaya after passing it.
    "(It means) to defeat external enemies as well as the internal ones in order to determine and realise one's identity - Ukrainian identity - which exists and must be somehow revived," tourist from Georgia Nataliya Shavgulidze added.
    The second mural, "Time for Change", took 35 days to complete and resulted in the biggest mural Interesni Kazki has ever done. Several elements in the painting are related to the theme of fighting, such as a snake with a human face captured by a kosack, a tank with sign reading 'Towards Kiev' and a monkey holding an assault rifle.
    Another giant mural called "Renaissance", which appeared on one of the buildings in downtown Kiev, shows a girl wearing Ukrainian traditional daisy-chain with ribbons in Ukrainian flag colours.
    French graffiti artist Julien Mallan together with his Ukrainian colleague from Sevastopol worked together on this 15-metre high graffiti.
    "My friend told me that it symbolises a Ukrainian girl holding all the buildings under her hands. And I think the buildings symbolises the buildings in the city centre of Kiev. So I really like that painting, actually I have never seen such a painting before," tourist from Turkey, Yasmin Arsin, said.
    "There is a bit of dullness. I would like to fill it with something, for example, with such art. It would be very nice. It would adorn the city itself and in general it is interesting for tourists. It could be our special point," Kiev resident Pavlo Loktionov said.
    Portuguese street artist Alexandre Farto created a portrait of Serhiy Nigoyan (1993-2014), the first Euromaidan activist killed on January 22, 2014 during the uprising which toppled the pro-Russian President Victor Yanukovich.
    Farto creates fascinating large scale portraits by carefully scratching and chipping plasters out of walls. With the use of hammers, chisels and pneumatic drills, he sculpts the stencilled pieces to create texture, dimension and layers.
    He said he hopes his work will help people remember the events in Kiev.
    "I hope my work and my little work that I did can give a bit of comfort to the family of Sergei and to all the people that lost their loved ones in the name of the cause. And I hope that cause is not forgotten and I think the impact that wall has, has a lot of meaning in terms that people really want to stick to those ideals," Farto said during presentation of his work.
    The portrait of Nigoyan is located at Heavenly Hundred Garden, a community project developed by volunteers in central Kiev with no official support. Gagik Nigoyan, father of slain protester, and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko were among guests at opening ceremony of the art piece.
    Born in 1987, Farto gained prominence when his work of a face carved into a wall appeared alongside a picture by street artist Banksy at the Cans Festival in London in 2008. A photograph of him creating the work then appeared on the front page of The Times and his work now adorns buildings in Moscow, Italy, London, Portugal and New York.
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