greetings, my name is myroslava barchuk and this is a self-titled program, a joint project of ukrainian foam and the espresso tv channel. today we are talking about malevich, just these days he turns 145 years old, and i think this is a good opportunity to talk about why he is a ukrainian artist, why he is a person with a ukrainian, at least cultural identity, and tatyana filevska will help me with this. guest, she is the creative director of the ukrainian institute, a researcher of the work of kazimir malevich and ukrainian art in general avant-garde tatyana, congratulations, good evening. good evening. ah, i suggest looking at malevich, but through the prism of our own identity. do you remember the year 2016, when such an idea arose to rename boryspil airport to malevich airport. and then.

there were different opinions, there were terribly heated discussions, i remember such a position that people said, well, to attribute ukrainianness to malevich, this is our inferiority complex, malevich is not ukrainian, and in principle and in the end , the airport remained, there was a vote, the airport remained boryspil, but i'm not about that i'm talking about the fact that six years have passed, and it seems to me that during this time something has shifted , first of all... in ourselves, and when it shifted in ourselves, then museums in the world began to call malevich a ukrainian artist, and not a russian artist, it has something to do with how our identity has changed in the last six years, certainly what we have learned about ourselves in these six years, in the last two years, has a lot to do with how we evaluate events , which happened before us, and our past, our...

attitude towards it, and we reevaluate a lot, in many respects, and those events that took place. also, it seems to me that our work that has been done in this direction is very important here, because if we talk about kazimir malevich, yes, this is what i do, and i know how much has been done over the last six years there were studies, publications, films, and actually we understood that malevich is ukrainian. and why we can fit him into our context, and how he is related to it, because it is precisely in these connections that identity is revealed, a connection is revealed, and when we do not know anything about malevich knew and only heard from researchers from russia that it is impossible to talk about any kyiv period, because there are no documents, there are no archives, how can you prove that he did something there at all and that it had some significance, and it is another matter when there are published materials of his lectures in kyiv. institute, which

are available in this book in both english and french, this book actually came out in the 16th year, then it was still later, separate translations were published, who published it? this publication, the publishing house of genealogies, is supported by the reviewer business school, and it actually took place and this edition was published together with an international conference dedicated to malevich, actually such conferences. in these years there have already been two, and it is also very important, when researchers of malevich from all over the world and researchers of the vanguard from all over the world come to kyiv, uh, in order to negotiate about new finds and new discoveries in malevich, if i remember correctly , in the genealogy there was the same published study of the great jean-claude marcade in the 12th year, a french researcher of creativity malevich, and it was he who started the first, at least i learned from him that malevich can be called ukrainian. well, i think, if

we talk about who was the first to pay attention to malevich's connections with ukraine, it would be fair to mention dmytro omlyanovich gorbachev, who in general is the discoverer of the avant-garde, this is a person who actually with his own hands unwound these shafts that were intended for destruction, this special fund in the national art museum, it was the avant-garde art that was purposefully destroyed by the bolsheviks in the 1930s, and of which in fact very little remained, and we ourselves... destroyed, their works were destroyed, archives were destroyed, and this actually made it possible to say later that you had nothing here, yes, if, how can we talk about kyiv malevich's period, if there is nothing to talk about, that's it, but as it turned out, some archives have the property of emerging from the ashes, appearing and actually creating history, rewriting, we will definitely talk about this now, about the fact that in malevich is ukrainian, yes, why is it ukrainian, but you mentioned dmytro gorbachev, i listened to him beautiful i recommend lectures in

ukrainian to everyone, it is not called an art institute, but an art academy, yes, and he talks about malevich in particular, these are extremely interesting lectures. and it was actually at the art academy, but i remember that you made a film about malevich in the 19th year, yes, and this film is called malevich was born in ukraine, you are the screenwriter of this film, and what struck me was what pavlo gudimov tells , that in this very art academy there was opposition to that, in kyiv there was opposition to that malevich is a part of this history. academies that malevich taught in them, that is , some of the teachers did not know this at all, how could this happen, why did this happen, how could this happen, by the way, these are the lectures of dmitri gorbachev that you mention, we also organized them, i was a co-organizer these actions, and it was actually an attempt to return

malevich to the walls of the academy, in fact, when malevich was teaching, in the late 20s, it was a different time, it was a different art academy, it was not for nothing that she was on... the european journalist who came to kyiv, she called kyiv bauhaus, because it was an absolutely unique art school, where volodymyr tatlin, oleksandr bogomazov, mykhailo boychuk, malevich, and a lot of generally prominent artists who gathered within the same walls taught at the same time, and each of them had their own teaching method, it was the period of this ukrainization and skrypnyk's politics, so it's all thanks to him. and this is specifically the year 1924, 1930, we have clear dates of this period, when ivan vrona was the rector, he was actually appointed as a violinist there and actually, even the appointment avron malevich agreed with the violinist, as we know from the documents, that is, they were direct direct connections, and this is actually this

story, which is bright, short, yes, but bright these 6 years, it ends in the 30th year, when actually this wave of repressions against... fine art from moscow is rolling to kyiv, and because these persecutions of avant-gardes actually began in russia, and from the mid-20s, after lenin died, stalin came to power, when revolutionary art was no longer needed, because the soviet union turned into an empire very quickly, and obviously a totalitarian regime does not need revolutionary art, it is dangerous for it. now we will talk about repressions, but i understand correctly, you are now talking about the fact that these repressions, which were back then in the days of stalinism, the consequence and inertia of this attitude towards avant-gardeism is the oblivion in the modern kyiv art academy, without a doubt, that is, it and the policy of the 1930s, which was introduced under stalin, it still

has as a result oblivion and unwillingness to have anything to do with malevich at all, in my opinion experience, and since the mid-1990s , we have been trying... to convince the academy that malevich is worth at least hanging his portrait on the walls next to other professors, and i know personally how many times i have heard no from rectors, deputy rectors and so on, and how do they say it, i.e. why, that he is not a socialist realist, i.e. that, and actually, well, that is , they are talking about the fact that what is taught in the academy, that canon is socialist realist, which still seems to have gone nowhere , that actually this abracadabra, which they do not understand, and for them... malevich remains an inexplicable abracadabra, in fact they disown him and do not want to have anything in common with him, yes, that is why it is, yes, it is still hostile, it is quite foreign to the institute, i cannot say, that if actually there is not a single teacher there who understands this,

and it is worth mentioning that dmytro antonyuk is also in our film, he is a teacher of architecture, and actually he reconstructed this presence of malevich in his office with his own efforts, he even created around it... that it was it was malevich's office, although it is not clear whether it is, but he recreated the exhibition there and actually this is his personal effort, yes, because he also had this moment when his foreign colleague from sweden, it seems, came there, and she shamed him by the fact that she knew about what malevich taught in kyiv, he, while teaching in the same walls, knew nothing about it, had never heard of it, and this very personal experience of his was so traumatic that it led to , that he... wanted to return this malevich, and here it is, actually we tried to somehow legitimize it within these walls, but unfortunately, it is still not the case, and malevich is still such an alien element in the academy, the most influential ukrainian artist is a stranger to

the main educational and artistic center in kyiv, i interrupted you, you were talking about... the pressure on malevich, they started when, because he initially identified himself with the revolution, that's how he also called himself a revolutionary, when the races started. actually, well, that is, the revolution, as such, it was not only politically, it was happening, these ideas are revolutionary, they were first of all formed at the beginning of the century in the cultural environment, because people understood that the old empires must die, and actually artists, in particular avant-garde artists, they tried to build for themselves this, this future without empires, where people are all free, where everyone has the same opportunities. can equally realize themselves, and in fact these are beautiful ideas about a bright future, they

were formed in the environment of avant-gardes even before the 14th year, that is, in fact, the revolution was not the first, but art was the first, yes, and when this political wave actually appeared, namely bolshevism, they realized that they needed this support, and something that would visualize their idea of ​​this change. for the broad masses, who were often even illiterate, and some vivid images were needed, and that is why the bolsheviks adopted avant-garde art, they used it, because it illustrated this radicalism and changes, but this changed very quickly , despite the fact that artists themselves, they very often do not identified themselves with bolshevism, malevich , in fact, according to his political preferences, he was more of an anarchist, by the way, even before the 19th year, if... an anarchist was published in the newspaper, that is, this also speaks of his certain connotations and identification in

the political sensei, then obviously , when anarchism was defeated, there was a certain reality to which he adapted, so he cooperated with the bolshevik regime, he even had a rather successful career, he, for example, carried out a reform of museums, he proposed to create the network of museums of modern art in the soviet union, which was based on modern art in... they bought works from artists and distributed them to all these museums in the soviet union, that is, in principle, the network of museums that, as we know, the soviet one, if this is malevich's idea, he came up with it as a manager , let's say, a cultural person, and implemented it, but malevich, if you read his memoirs and diaries carefully, he was very skeptical of the bolsheviks, he was never a supporter of these ideas, although he were very good connections, and some very high-ranking bolsheviks there periodically signed up for him when he... was arrested there or wanted to be released somewhere, or was not released from outside the soviet union, but

in reality it all ended very tragically for the avant-garde avant-garde art in in general, and for specific people, for malevich, because when the government changed in the 1920s, they began to persecute the avant-garde, at first it began with the capital of that time, leningrad or petrograd, they actually closed the institute of art cultures yamalevich was in charge for three years, he is accused of all mortal and non-mortal sins, and in fact they cut off his opportunities for any activity, and then kyiv appears in his life, as this is the last hope, he is invited to kyiv, given complete freedom , and here, in fact, skrypnyk still had the opportunity for a certain time to restrain this wave, yes, which came from russia, a wave of repression, a wave of persecution, and for a few years this atmosphere of freedom remained here, malevich... planned to move to kyiv in fact, to transport his students, his family, but this possibility closed in the 30th year,

this wave of repression came, vrona was dismissed from the institute, all these avant-garde preferences were banned, this is already the case in kyiv, although kyiv was not even then the capital, but already in kyiv , all these prohibitions came, malevich was arrested, while he was under arrest, he was dismissed from the institute, everything that was in his office was thrown away. he had his own office at the institute, and actually this story ended very sadly. tell me, be it please, but before that he went to berlin, he participated in the berlin exhibition, he traveled through poland, reached berlin, because he was there for several months, and suddenly the soviet authorities ordered him to return, it was clear to him, why, i will now say what i am basing it on, so that... everything was clear to malevich, what would happen to him next, and why

he was forced to return, because there are his wills of the 27th year, and as far as i understand, he was going to berlin and he was taking out some things, i understand that some texts, so his own, some works to preserve, and he leaves this kind of will in berlin, this is the 27th year, the 27th year, this, and he left this text in berlin, in case of my death. imagine in case of my death or hopeless imprisonment, and if the owner of these manuscripts wishes, wishes to publish them, then for this they need to be studied and then translated into... another language, because being under revolutionary influence at the time, they can be strong contradictions with this protection, with this form of art protection that i have now. i mean, what does it mean? this means that, firstly, he understands that he will either be killed or imprisoned, and he says that he is under, he is under pressure, i

understand correctly, why he, why he did not stay in berlin, when he, when he was called? well, actually malevich , when he went on this trip, he had a plan to somehow stay in europe, this trip was originally planned as a trip to warsaw, berlin and paris, paris was his dream, like every artist, modernist, but it was not destined, malevich came to warsaw and there he submitted an application for a french visa, in this in the questionnaire, he identified himself as a pole, although he always wrote about himself as a ukrainian, already at that time, that's how he wrote about himself. a ukrainian, because after the soviet-polish war of the 21st year, and even if it was dangerous to be a pole in the soviet union. i suspect that this became known to the special services, so when he arrived in berlin, he had just opened his exhibition in berlin, and literally the next day a telegram arrived demanding that he return to the soviet

union in 24 hours. he was only in berlin for a few days, right? yes, well, that is, he had time to arrive, unpack the exhibition. a few days, that is, he was in germany there, well, not long, literally there for two weeks, and so he was forced, literally the day after the opening of the exhibition, he was forced to return, that is, he did not succeed, he did not manage to stay in the west, so he did not managed to get a visa as a pole to go to france to get involved, the poles weren't really sure whether he was collaborating with the bolshevik regime or a spy, that is... he got, let's say, between two swords, and, between fire and sword, yes, that is, between two such systems, and moreover, there is a suspicion that in this, in this telegram, there were threats to his loved ones, because he was left with a daughter, mother, wife, his students, who certainly, well, could have been victims of this blackmail, and

he returns to the soviet union, he is arrested, for what? there are memories of the family that when he returned to moscow, he was immediately arrested and kept in lubyanka for several days. this is unreliable, that is, unconfirmed archival history, because first of all, russia has never opened its archives, let alone the archives of its special services, so it is impossible to verify this as of now. this is based only on the memories of his family, maybe, and maybe he was actually under this arrest for a few days, but in fact, what... such a significant arrest that was in his life, it happened exactly in the 30th year, that is, this 2.5 years after returning from germany, and the actual reason for this rest was a trip abroad, because he was accused of espionage in favor of germany, he had some stamps left from that trip, which, when he was arrested, were found and he

was accused of espionage in favor of germany of espionage, and here... this country, which did this, actually broke a person fate, because he will die literally in five years from cancer, but in principle, it is obvious that his health was somehow damaged by surviving, and this country after all says when, when he gains world recognition and world fame, she says: this is a russian artist, and malevich is written everywhere a russian, i am mine... this is an introduction to malevich's ukrainianness. please tell us what, what arguments do we have that this is a person of ukrainian cultural identity? well, we can talk about a number of, let's say, things that defined malevich, his personality, his views, his attitude to

art, in addition to the very fact of being born in kyiv, moreover, in kyiv on zhilyanska street, this is important. because it was the environment of the old community, the tragomanovs and kosachis lived across the street from it, that is, it was the environment of people who actually dreamed of ukraine, and they actually lived this ukrainianness, ukrainian culture, and even despite the fact that it was a polish family, yes, if such poles, impoverished nobility, were ukrainized, it is obvious that there were connections, and that was all the same if an environment that mingled with each other, then malevich's family. lived in the ukrainian villages until malevich was actually 18 years old, and this forever determined his attitude to life and, in general, some of his ideals in life. he writes in his autobiography at the end. life, that he admires the whole life of the peasants, he likes their life, their houses , their clothes, them, their food, their art, and in general ukrainian peasant women were my first

art teachers, this is his direct quote, and he imitates them in everything, he believes that this is actually the real life, a free life, he says that they live according to nature harmoniously, that they go singing in the morning to the fields and work in the evening with the sun. returns home also singing, that is, for him it is some kind of idyll, which he is, well, already being there as a person, and on before his death, he knew that he was dying, he considered this to be a paradise on earth and his own paradise, that is, this ukrainian childhood was for him the best thing that happened in his life. then he very quickly understands that he has this desire to be an artist, yes, he is very interested in it, his mother supports and teaches him. his various crafts, he actually learns from ukrainians, from ukrainians this too, and he strives to plan this profession, and this is

also connected with kyiv, actually, first of all, the one where he sees the picture for the first time, it was a painted shop window, but he describes it like this, that it was a girl sitting on a donkey, peeling potatoes, and he was struck by the skill of the artist, it was so realistic, yes, that one could... get confused and think, that this was a real , living girl, and it affects him for the rest of his life, yes, that is, he remembers this image all his life. in kyiv, his mother buys him his first set of professional paints, in kyiv he enters the mykola murashko kyiv drawing school, in kyiv he enters the workshop for the first time professional artist mykola pemonenko, to whom he would later appeal in his works, and actually his central theme is another, well , let's say not... not necessarily realistic, but objective painting, these are two peasant cycles, these are 10- those years and then the end of the 20s, that is, the peasant for him,

the ukrainian peasant whom he saw in his childhood, is a certain, well, the main actor of his paintings, that is, he constantly turns to this theme, returns to it already mature , already after suprematism in this way the so-called supernaturalistic period of his at the end of the 20s, because this topic... does not let him go, and he believes that it remains relevant for him, the paradise, the ideal that he sees for himself, he sees precisely in the village. next, of course, that is, we are talking about those things, now, that shaped malevich, that influenced him. next, it is very important to what extent malevich influenced the ukrainian context, the ukrainian environment. and here it is very important for us, actually these 20s, when he returned to kyiv as an already formed artist, and he starts teaching in kyiv. art institute, he actually reformats education , because he is invited not only to teach, but also to give methodological and such instructions

to help rebuild this system, because malevich, he was also a theoretician and he built his own pedagogical system in art, yes, that is he tolerates this kyiv environment, he communicates with the new generation, he publishes in his series the latest articles in the new generation. what is the new generation? it was a new generation in the 1920s, the main magazine, probably in the entire soviet union, which was devoted to contemporary art, was published by mykhailo semenko, actually the leader of ukrainian futurism, who, even as a young poet , already knew about malevich's suprematism and devoted a number of his suprapoetry, it's as if suprematism in poetry, that is, this connection between semenko and malevich, it generally has such a tenacity in the decade, and here it is actually at the end. they already communicate directly, and semenko invites malevich to be published in a new generation, here we are in this second book, which i want to show today, yaryna

tsymbel actually publishes for the first time the proof that malevich had a direct connection with the new generation, here is malevich's letter to poltoratsky, in which, for example, malevich sends his greetings to semenkov, yes, that is, if we are talking about a certain circle of friends, that is, a certain kind of friendly communication. such an interaction, there is actually a connection with lesya ukrainka, because malevich teaches at the institute together with svitozar drahomanov, svitozar drahomanov is a cousin of lesya ukrainka, he has a camera, he takes photographs objects and things and objects and paintings by malevich, actually there at the request of malevich are sent to certain magazines, yes, that is, this is an environment that communicates very closely, they have joint projects, they do something together, they... dream about something there for the future, yes, that is, this is a very important factor, when malevich was very closely inscribed in the ukrainian environment, again, his last personal

exhibition during his lifetime takes place in the kyiv map. gallery is in its 30th year, and it's such a wild success there that extending it for a month, and and and then if malevich hopes that these paintings will be sold and remain here and in ukraine and for the ukrainians themselves, that is, there are a lot of themes that connect and leave malevich actually embedded in this context. and please tell me about this artil, which is amazing. in the village of verbivka, where this artillery was led, as i understand it, by oleksandra ekster, what kind of artillery was it and what did malevich have to do with it, this, thank you for remembering, is also a very important plot, in fact, if when malevich, yes, he did not live in ukraine, but this connection would still have lasted and continued, it is about arcil in the village of verbivka, verbivka was the estate of natalya davydova, natalya davydova was

actually the wife of the son of the decembrist, she herself was from the ancient cossack family gudym levkovych, and it must be said that this ancient cossack family also has its own strength and its history in them, traditionally, this family was associated with the creation of textiles and various crafts, they had the workshop, which was engaged in paintings even during the times of the hetmanate, is not with paintings, i apologize, with embroidery even during the times of the hetmanate. and so natalya davydova herself, under the wave of such modern trends, as we would say, at that time decided to open an artil in her village and help the rural residents of this village, find their own tool for earning money, implementing some kind of creative work, it was fashionable then, it is a lot landowners created such artillery, this is cherkasy, sorry, yes, yes, it is now

cherkasy. it is not far from smila, kamianka, these are beautiful places, i went there recently with research, and i strongly advise everyone to go and see these places, they are incredible, and actually davydova herself is an artist, she is friends with alexandra exter, alexandra exter, this is another great figure of this time in kyiv, yes, because she is actually the majority she lived her life in kyiv, and in kyiv she implemented her projects, and here is oleksandra ekster, she is the art director of this art team, she... actually forms the concept, as we would say, of this startup, and she invites the cooperation of various modern artists she knows from different cities i apologize to the soviet union, already then, and from the not-yet-then russian empire, because we are talking now about the 15th year, yes, that is, actually, when this russian empire is already shaking so much, but it is still holding on, and ekster invites malevich, whom he also knows

and they communicate well and meet at joint exhibitions, and malevich, creating his suprematism, first gives him as sketches for embroidery in the village of verbivka, that is, before showing it at the famous 010 exhibition in petrograd in december in the 15th year, he gives these sketches, probably somewhere at the end of summer or the beginning of autumn, because the verbivka exhibition took place in october, that is, in a few months and... here are these peasant women in the village of verbivka embroidering supremacist pillows, scarves, some simple objects of use, yes, objects of use and decorate them with these abstract forms, that is, in fact, if these peasant women were the first , the first audience, the first viewers of suprematism, and they actually began to interact with them immediately, and if they reincarnated them in the form of embroideries, which in some certain subjects and objects, that is, this

connection. listening to you and thinking, my lord , what could it be, yes, if not, if all this had not been destroyed, yes, how the culture would have developed amazingly, yes, yes, we can only guess, but in fact these are absolutely incredible things, and actually the exhibition of verbiv embroidery, willow embroidery, it was super successful, it traveled around europe, it even went overseas, and traveled and... all these things were wildly successful, that is, it is the year 915 - this is exactly what is called a jump, its a leap into objectlessness, i don't know to whom does it belong to him, or did i see it for the first time, actually in jean claude marchet, i don’t know if it’s me, whose saying it is, what it meant to him, how it is, how he approached it, i know that he is in he did all this in secret, yes, because he did not want to be this creator at first.