Art as a National Therapy
- 26.12.2020, 16:42
How Volha Yakubouskaya treats people with her pictures with cats.
After the tragic events associated with the elections, the artist Volha Yakubouskaya could not come to her senses and began to paint fluffy white cats with white-red-white flags in their paws, which every Belarusian now knows, writes the website of the Belsat TV channel.
"It was a terrible state of stress, grief, tears," Volha recalls the events of those days. "And I look at how Nina walks with the flag near these huge people in black. I thought that even this grandmother has enough strength, courage not to break, not to bend, not to crumble, not to sit and cry but to get up and do what she can."
This is how a picture appeared, which almost every Belarusian now knows: a fluffy white cat with a white-red-white flag in its paw and huge wolves hang over it.
"I drew a cat, and when I drew it, I realized that it was Nina Bahinskaya - the one I had long wanted to draw. And the wolves drew themselves somehow. They appeared like background," the artist speaks about her work. "In fact, everyone understands that wolves are very good compared to those I portray."
With this work, Volha Yakubouskaya's series began in which there are now more than 20 paintings dedicated to the events and personalities of recent months.
"I couldn't help but draw Masha because the story on the border impressed me a lot. A lot was drawn, and this is good, and I also decided to create my own work on this topic," Volha says about the painting dedicated to Marija Kalesnikava. "Masha turned out so confident. I think Masha will be delighted with this work when she is finally released, and everything will be fine."
Viktar Babaryka, Alena Leuchanka, Volha Khizhynkova, Tor Band, and many more have already become characters in Volha's paintings. For various reasons, the works have not yet reached their heroes. Only Nina Bahinskaya, Maxim Katz, and the mother of Ivan Krasouski managed to recieve the works.
It is known that in her work, Volha did not ignore the tragic events on the Square of Changes: the death of Raman Bandarenka.
"This is a picture of pain. I cried when I drew it; here, the colors are mixed with tears. It's true. And I understood that everyone was crying —everyone who knew this story. And we cried an ocean which can become the ninth wave. A person is alive as long as he is remembered. I think Roma will be remembered by everyone and always."
Due to the need to react quickly to events, Volha sometimes feels like an artist-reporter. The plans are to capture every group, every person who stood up to protect the rights of Belarusians.
"Of course, I'll draw the Kupalautsy! It's just that theater and art, in general, is such a deep topic. I would like some kind of plot, not that just a cat is standing among the wolves. I want a deep meaning, and I'm still thinking about it."
At first, Volha was shocked by the interest in her work, but now she understands: paintings have become a kind of therapy for people.
"People saw these works, and they understood that they needed it. You can look from a different perspective, not based on pain and tragedy, but proceed from the fact that the bad will end anyway. And I want to believe that our life will change for the better,' Volha Yakubouskaya says goodbye to the film crew of "I Have a Right." "While I have plots, I will draw. And my dream is to paint a huge picture, where there will be cats of all colors, shapes, and types - as if we are all, and we are all cats. Everyone is very different, and we are all together."