Art Exhibition: Ukrainian Portraits of Resilience
Faces that tell a story of Ukrainian resilience
Louise Pasterfield: Portraits of Resilience Exhibition
Truro Cathedral, 17-27 August
When Russia escalated its invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022, Saltash artist Louise Pasterfield felt she had to do something. Angry that this war should even be happening and upset by the footage we were seeing on our TVs, newspapers and social media, she picked up her brushes and started to paint the faces of Ukraine, inspired by those images.
Her first portrait was of a Ukrainian woman called Valentina, whose back yard had just been hit by artillery. Louise posted it on Instagram four days after the invasion. Little did she know the impact her portraits would have. Right from that first painting, the response was overwhelming. She started to get messages from the wives, mothers, daughters, husbands, fathers, sons, and friends of the people she’d painted. They wanted to thank her for “not forgetting” about Ukraine, and to ask if they could have prints of the paintings. Some of her paintings were also featured online by Vogue UA, Elle UA and Ukraine Artists on Instagram.
And then, something quite remarkable happened: “Ukrainians have been sending me photographs they have taken, asking if I would paint them,” said Louise.
“One woman sent me a photo that she took of her two-year-old daughter on the second day of the war. It was taken in the basement of their house in the Kharkiv region. They had no electricity, no heating, no water, and outside, the Russian army was all around them. In the photograph, her daughter is painting by candlelight, wrapped up against the cold.
“Other people have sent me photos of family members who have died in the war. One woman sent me a photo of her father who died near Bakhmut, asking me if I could paint it. That was very moving.”
Louise spotted a video on social media of one of the defenders of Mariupol being reunited with his wife after he was released from Russian captivity. Her painting of the couple, inspired by the short clip, brought this message from the woman: “You have painted one of the most important moments of my life.”
Another painting was of Arman Soldin with a ginger cat on his shoulder. Arman was a journalist for the APF news agency and was killed in the war. A friend of the man messaged Louise to say: “I am writing this message to tell you I was very touched by the painting you made of Arman. I knew him very well, and it warms my heart to see such a beautiful homage.”
That very first painting of Valentina was inspired by a photograph taken by the New York Times photographer Lynsey Addario, and all the photographers are credited for their original work. Many have messaged Louise to praise her for her paintings, including the Pulitzer Prize winning video journalist Vasilisa Stepanenko, who was one of the producers of the Oscar winning documentary film, 20 Days in Mariupol.
“It’s the first time, in a war, where we’ve had all these images coming out,” said Louise, “there were just so many images. When I started getting comments, like ‘that’s my son’ and ‘that’s a friend of mine who has died’, I just felt I had to keep going.
“It wasn’t about copying the photographs; it was about seeing something else. When I do a painting, they can take between a day and two days to do. When you stare at a photograph for 14 hours, you begin to see different things. I don’t use photos that tell the whole story, because how can I add to that? I choose ones where I think I can bring something new and amplify the inherent emotions.”
Two and a half years and 200 portraits after ‘Valentina’, Louise feels it’s as important as ever for her to keep on telling the stories. One of her more recent paintings is of a mother holding her young child after the bombing of Ohmatdyt Children’s Hospital in Kyiv: “The photographer, Nadia Karpova, took the photo for Frontliner. It was her first real reportage, and she didn’t feel it was a powerful enough image. The guy who runs Frontliner told me that when I did painted it, it boosted her confidence’.”
Louise is showing 50 of her watercolour paintings at the Portraits of Resilience exhibition at Truro Cathedral from 17-27 August, during cathedral opening times (10.00-17.00 Mon-Sat, 11.30-16.00 on Sundays, 12.00-15.00 on bank holidays). The event coincides with Ukrainian Independence Day on 24 August. The opening event at 12-2pm on 17 August has live music from violinist Yuliya Knowles, and the Ukrainian Sunflowers Choir, made up of women from Ukraine who are refugees living in Cornwall. The MP for Truro and Falmouth, Jayne Kirkham, will also be expressing words of support for the Ukrainian people.
Louise has been helped by Kyiv-born Yulia Fedorenko, who moved to in the UK in 2014 and lives in St Germans. The exhibition is in six sections: The World Upside Down, Keeping the Vigil, Companions in Adversity, How Much More, The Price of Freedom, and Light in the Darkness.
The paintings will be presented as they are, not in frames, as Louise explained: “I want it to be raw, and I also want to recreate the look of my studio.” On a final panel, people can add their thoughts and prayers on magnetic sunflowers and donate to the DEC Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal if they wish, using a QR code. Some of the paintings will also be available to buy as prints using a QR code.
“When I started this, it was a way of making people aware of what’s happening, keeping it front of mind and giving support to the Ukrainian people,” said Louise. “A lot of them have found it comforting and are glad that people around the world are taking an interest in them, not forgetting them.
“And I also want to give hope. Like the painting of the soldier who’s a violinist, and the children who are carrying on, even though the school behind them has been bombed out. I don’t want everything to be miserable. It’s really to tell stories.”
The portraits can be seen in digital form on Louise’s website and Instagram page, where there are also time lapse videos which show how the paintings come together.
This is an exhibition of 30 watercolour paintings documenting the strengths and struggles of Ukrainian people at war. It is designed to coincide with Ukrainian Independence Day which is the 24 August. These selected paintings are by local artist Louise Pasterfield, from Saltash, Cornwall who has painted over 200 paintings since the beginning of the conflict to support Ukrainians and to increase awareness of the daily challenges people face.