Ukrainian Cultural Festival is co-presented by Razom for Ukraine and the Ukrainian Institute, Kyiv and produced in partnership with the National Ballet of Ukraine, Ukrainian Contemporary Music Festival, Yara Arts, Ukrainian Museum, KISFF, Linoleum Festival, and others and will take place October 15th through October 31st in New York.
Over the course of two weeks in October, you will have an opportunity to immerse yourself in the world of Ukrainian poetry and prose and check out the best in contemporary Ukrainian cinema.
Meet writers Halyna Kruk, Marianna Kiyanovska, Ostap Slyvynsky, Yuliia Illiukha, Olena Stiazhkina, Andriy Lyubka, and Alex Averbuch. Watch “Porcelain War,” “La Palisiada,” and other award-winning films.
Below is the schedule of events. Please check in often for changes and ticket information.
All Cinema program events to be announced the week of September 30th, please check back for more information.
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 15
National Ballet of Ukraine
Experience the magic of the National Ballet of Ukraine, one of the world’s top ballet companies and the country’s official ballet company, on their premiere tour of the United States, the first time in over 30 years since the dissolution of the USSR. Straight from the historic Kyiv National Opera House, these world-class dancers will captivate you with a stunning program featuring timeless classics, including The Dying Swan, Don Quixote, and Giselle. The program tells stories of love, loss, and triumph, leaving you mesmerized by the company’s unparalleled grace and strength. Prepare to be swept away as the dancers defy gravity, their bodies soaring high above the stage with dance movements filled with intensity, emotion, and perfect harmony.
Programming subject to change.
New York City Center
Time: 7:30 pm
Tickets: $45
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 15
Yara Arts Poetry Event
Bowery Poetry Club
More information to be announced soon.
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 16
“The Magic of Light”: Bandurist Julian Kyasty plays music from Yara’s new show
Renee and Chaim Gross Foundation
More information to be announced soon.
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 17
A Ukrainian Dictionary of War: An Evening with Ostap Slyvynsky
You must register by 5pm on October 16, 2024 in order to attend this event.
Please join the Ukrainian Studies Program at the Harriman Institute for A Ukrainian Dictionary of War: An Evening with Ostap Slyvynsky.
Ostap Slyvynsky is a Ukrainian poet, translator, essayist, and scholar. He authored five books of poetry: Sacrifice of Big Fish (1998), The Midday Line (2004), Ball in Darkness (2008), Adam (2012), The Winter King (2018), as well as The Dictionary of War (2023), a documentary book based on a testimony of participants and witnesses of the Russian aggression against Ukraine. His books have been published in the USA (The Winter King, Lost Horse Press 2023), Germany, Poland, Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Slovakia, and Macedonia. He is also known for translating the works by Derek Walcott, William Carlos Williams, Charles Simic, Czesław Miłosz, Olga Tokarczuk, Georgi Gospodinov, and many others.
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 18
Amid all losses: Ukrainian poets as witnesses
When poets confront war, their writing transforms to both document and bear witness. Whether in Ostap Slyvynsky’s “Dictionary of War”, Yuliia Illiyukha’s “My Women” or Alex Averbukh’s documentary poetry based on online conversations of Ukrainians living under Russian occupation, real people emerge with their stories, offering a harrowing account of what it is like to endure a violent invasion.
Razom for Ukraine Office, 54 W 21st St, New York, NY 10010
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 19
My Woman by Yuliia Illyukha: NYC Launch
Join us to celebrate the US Book Launch of Yuliia Iliukha’s My Women, translated from Ukrainian by Hanna Leliv. It will be held at dear friend books on Saturday, October 19th @ 7:30pm.
Winner of 128 LIT’s 2023 International Chapbook Prize, My Women is an urgent and poignant story collection of women confronted by the countless brutalities of war. It locates the voices and devastating experiences of those who have been silenced, those who have lost loved ones, those who have fought and persevered, and those who have broken down. Through poetic repetition, the nameless protagonists, “My Women,” bring succinct and emotionally charged stories that evoke life during war in Ukraine with an intensity that is at times excruciatingly difficult yet deeply moving.
Dear Friend Books
343A Tompkins Avenue Brooklyn, NY 11216
7:30PM
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 20
Water Drops on Burning Rocks: Nina Murashkina and Xavier Escala Art show
More information to be announced soon.
Mriya Gallery
MONDAY, OCTOBER 21
The Voices of Babyn Yar: A book talk and reading by Marianna Kiyanovska
With this collection of stirring poems the award-winning Ukrainian poet honors the victims of the Holocaust by writing their stories of horror, death, and survival in their own imagined voices. Artful and carefully intoned, the poems convey the experiences of ordinary civilians going through unbearable events leading to the massacre at Kyiv’s Babyn Yar from a first-person perspective to an effect that is simultaneously immersive and estranging. While conceived as a tribute to the fallen, the book raises difficult questions about memory, responsibility, and commemoration of those who had witnessed an evil that verges on the unspeakable.
About the author: Award-winning Ukrainian writer, translator, literary scholar, and public figure whose works have been translated into eighteen languages. She is the author of more than a dozen books of poetry, prose, and literary translation. A winner of the Vilenica International Literary Festival and the CEI Fellowship (2007), she was also awarded the Gloria Artis Medal for Merit to Culture in Poland (2013). In 2020, she was recognized with the prestigious Taras Shevchenko National Prize in Literature for The Voices of Babyn Yar. She is the Laureate of the Zbigniew Herbert International Literary Prize and was named the European Poet of Freedom (both in 2022). The English-language translation of The Voices of Babyn Yar has won the 2022 Aldo and Jeanne Scaglione Prize for a Translation of a Literary Work from the Modern Language Association (MLA) and the 2021–22 Translation Prize from the American Association for Ukrainian Studies (AAUS). This book was also shortlisted for the 2023 Best Literary Translation into English Prize from the American Association of Teachers of Slavic and Eastern European Languages (AATSEEL)
6:30pm | Razom for Ukraine Office, 54 W 21st St, New York, NY 10010
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22
Porcelain War Film Screening
Join us for a screening of “Porcelain War” that is screened as part of Ukrainian Cultural Festival (UCF). After winning the Jury Award for Best Documentary at Sundance 2024, the film has screened all over the world collecting various accoloids. As descripbed by a number of publications, Porcelain War masterfully illustrates the enduring power of art in the face of adversity – a cinematic essays that takes many forms. Few are as fragile and contemplative as “Porcelain War”.
Amidst the chaos and destruction of the brutal Russian invasion of Ukraine, three artists defiantly find inspiration and beauty as they defend their culture and their country. In a war waged by professional soldiers against ordinary civilians, Slava Leontyev, Anya Stasenko, and Andrey Stefanov choose to stay behind, armed with their art, their cameras, and, for the first time in their lives, their guns.
Despite daily shelling, Anya finds resistance and purpose in her art, Andrey takes the dangerous journey to get his young family to safety abroad, and Slava becomes a weapons instructor for ordinary people who have become unlikely soldiers. As the war intensifies, Andrey picks up his camera to film their story, and on tiny porcelain figurines, Anya and Slava capture their idyllic past, uncertain present, and hope for the future.
Co-directed by Leontyev and Brendan Bellomo, with extraordinary footage from first-time cinematographer Stefanov, Porcelain War is a stunning tribute to the resilience of the human spirit, one which embodies the passion and fight, that only an artist can put back into the world when it’s crumbling around them.
Location: TBD
Time: 7 p.m.
Note: The film will be screened in Ukrainian with English subtitles.
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 24
Writer as a Volunteer: How Ukrainian culture aids the war effort. In conversation with Andriy Lyubka in conversation with Irena Solomko
Amidst the horrors of a full-scale invasion, many in Ukraine believe that Ukrainian culture has undergone a renaissance. New bookstores are opening, theaters are drawing crowds, and art exhibitions are breaking attendance records. During this meeting, Andriy Lyubka will discuss how, after the onset of the invasion, Ukrainian culture became a vital component of the country’s defense strategy. Beyond strengthening national identity and boosting morale, it has provided practical support, aiding the Armed Forces of Ukraine both financially and materially. The writer will present his nonfiction book War from the Rear, and share his volunteer efforts, which have raised over $1.5 million and resulted in the purchase of more than 310 vehicles for the front lines. He will also highlight other significant initiatives within Ukrainian culture and art that actively support the military
6:30PM | Razom for Ukraine Office, 54 W 21st St, New York, NY 10010
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 24
La Palisiada
Join us for a screening of an award-winning narrative feature LA PALISIADA (FIPRESCI Award at the Rotterdam International Film Festival 2023). Philip Sotnychenko’s meta-cinematic investigation into the alienated underbelly of post-Soviet Ukraine is a muted reckoning with a past that must be confronted before its insidious grip on the present can be loosened.
Synopsis: Philip Sotnychenko’s award-winning DV debut feature uncovers the hidden connections between the violence of the past and the present. Shot on raw DV cameras, La Palisiada centres around an investigation into the murder of a police colonel in 1996 that ultimately leads to the final execution to take place in independent Ukraine. 25 years later, a new generation of young Ukrainians are facing their own personal and political crises, with shocking consequences.
Location: The Quad, 34 W 13th St, New York, NY 10011, United States
Time: Doors open at 6:30 p.m. EST, the screening will begin at 7 p.m.
Note: The film will be screened in Ukrainian with English subtitles.
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 28
A Crash Course in Molotov Cocktails: Reading by Halyna Kruk
Halyna Kruk (1974) is an award-winning Ukrainian poet, writer, translator, and scholar. She is the author of five books of poetry/ Two collections have come out in English in the past two years: Griffin Poetry Prize shortlisted “A Crash Course in Molotov Cocktails” (Arrowsmith Press, 2022) and “Lost in living” (Lost Horse Press, 2024) Her numerous literary awards include the Sundara Ramaswamy Prize, the 2023 Women in Arts Award, the 2021 BookForum Best Book Award, the Smoloskyp Poetry Award, the Bohdan Ihor Antonych Prize, and the Hranoslov Award. She holds a PhD in Ukrainian baroque literature (2001). Kruk is a member of Ukrainian PEN; she lives and teaches in Lviv.
6:30pm | Razom for Ukraine Office, 54 W 21st St, New York, NY 10010
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 29
Ukrainian Virtuoso: the music of Victoria Poleva
The day before her work, The Bell, debuts at Carnegie Hall, Victoria Poleva sits down for a conversation with Leah Batstone of Ukrainian Cultural Music Festival. Several of Victoria’s piano pieces will be performed by NY based Irena Portenko and Anna Shelest.
On October 30th, Victoria Poleva’s work is performed by the American Composers Orchestra in Carnegie Hall as a part of their New Virtuoso: Borders concert.
7:00 | Faust Harrison Pianos 207W 58
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 31
Book Talk: Cecile the Lion Had to Die.
Olena Stiazhkina in conversation with Irena Chalupa
In Cecil the Lion Had to Die, Olena Stiazhkina follows four families through radical transformations when the Soviet Union unexpectedly implodes, independent Ukraine emerges, and neo imperial Russia occupies Ukraine’s Crimea and parts of the Donbas. Just as Stiazhkina’s decision to transition to writing in Ukrainian as part of her civic stance—performed in this book that begins in Russian and ends in Ukrainian—the stark choices of family members take them in different directions, presenting a multifaceted and nuanced Donbas.
Join the author in conversation with Razom Book Club’s Irena Chalupa for a deeper dive into the book and the process of writing it.
Olena Stiazhkina is from Donetsk, Ukraine. A historian by training with dozens of scholarly articles to her name, she taught Slavic history at Donetsk National University for over twenty years until Russia began another bloody chapter of that history with its 2014 invasion of Ukraine. Stiazhkina is also a writer who has published eleven books of fiction, from novels and short story collections to detective novels (the latter under the pen name Olena Iurska). Her historian’s background and writer’s acumen combine in a body of creative work that is gripping, sharply observed, and tender—yet hilarious, and furious, too. Stiazhkina has received numerous awards for her fiction over the years, most recently the 2023 Lviv UNESCO City of Literature Award for her novel Cecil the Lion Had to Die, a bilingual novel in Russian and Ukrainian. Cecil the Lion Had to Die (translated by Dominique Hoffman) and Ukraine, War, Love: A Donetsk Diary (translated by Anne O. Fisher) are now available in English from the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute.
6:30 PM | Razom for Ukraine Office, 54 W 21st St, New York, NY 10010
