Lamenting for Ukraine

Year: 2024
Medium: art performance / interdisciplinary collaboration
Duration: 45 minutes
Location: Shadbolt Centre of Art (Metro Vancouver, BC, Canada)
Date: April 28, 2024

Today, everyone is lamenting...
Someone loudly. Publicly, some quietly at night, and some really need it but don't dare.
Because it hurts.

Because it is so hard to admit to yourself that you have lost forever

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Virtually every culture used to have lamentation traditions that allowed people to cry through their grief as part of a group, easing the burden of pain together. Most of these traditions have been lost or are on their way out.

This ritualistic, theatrical work draws on Ukraine's ancient lamentation traditions (gholosinnia) to grieve the losses of war. Co-created by Anna Pidgorna, Anna Shylova-Kolomiets, Masha Birkby and Roksolana Uhryniuk, with additional texts by Anya Chibis Photography and Kateryna Sheliuk, the work weaves individual stories through ensemble laments expressing our collective sorrow over the horrors of russian aggression in Ukraine, as well as our hope for freedom and rebirth.

Pianist Anna Sagalova and violinist Jack Campbell contributed a program of contemporary works by Arvo Pärt, Kaija Saariaho, Yevhen Stankovych and Anna Pidgorna surrounding this ritual. Alexandr Shylov created the video projections, and was part of the video crew along with Anya Chibis Photography..