BROTHERS Violetta Oliinyk – performance

When your brothers are at war, you are also at war. When they cannot sleep at night because of the constant shelling, you too can not get to sleep, and you check to see when you were last contacted. And when the last time the “user was online” coincides with the time of another raid, it becomes frightening, just like in the old fable of the wild swans – “for one single word would mean death”. We are the only ones who can and must speak. Talk to the weapons suppliers, drone shop workers, tactical medicine and spread the word and look for the things they need.

We can talk, but we cannot lose our attention. It seems that if we put the phone down for a few minutes, we could miss an urgent request, and someone could be killed by our inattention. We are Ukrainians who are now volunteering at the front. Someone out there at war has parents, brothers, sisters, children, relatives. That is why all of us, losing our strength every day, weave rescue shirts from nettles so that all our wild swans come home alive.

In various cultures, there are stories of cursed brothers turned into birds, such as “The Wild Swans”, “Eleven Swans”, “Twelve Brothers”, “Seven Crows”, “Seven Cranes”… the same plot even appears in the ancient legend of King Lear. Usually, according to the plot of the tale, only the sister can free the brothers from the curse. She must weave a shirt for each brother from nettles plucked in the graveyard (or flax, thistle, flowers), and she must do it continuously, without smiling or saying a word. Only when the brothers wear these hand-woven garments will they transform themselves into human beings, and the curse will be broken.

(Violetta Oliinyk)

During the three-day performance, the artist will silently handcraft a shirt from previously picked nettles. This action refers to the horrors of the war in Ukraine and is a sign of solidarity with all those who have experienced separation from their loved ones.

When: 22/09–24/09/2023 (Fri–Sun) 3:00–7:00 p.m.
Where: Galeria Labirynt 2, ul. Grodzka 3, Lublin
Accessibility: The performance is held in a space inaccessible for people with motor impairments.
Admission: free
Curator: Mateusz Wszelaki