Victoria Hayward explains how she is using her artist residency at City Arts to decorate 100 eggs using a traditional Ukrainian batik dye technique, raising money for the Ukraine DEC appeal in the process
For many centuries, Ukrainians have been lighting candles and teaching their children the patterns to keep evil from the world. With careful hands, each generation teaches the next to write bright motifs of hope in melted beeswax on the surface of eggs. The intricately dyed eggs are called pysanky, and the method of decorating them is called ‘writing’, as the patterns are inscribed with hot wax using a stylus, rather than painted.
Some designs can be traced back to neolithic markings, and many symbols reflect the spiritual world of the original writers - marching stags and glittering stars, sheaves of wheat and protective oak leaves. Sunbursts are common, representing the pagan sun god Dazhboh. People reasoned that whilst they couldn’t reach the sky where their God lived, birds could - so eggs were decorated in tribute.
Originally, pysanky were written for ritual purposes - they were talismans gifted to show love or provide protection, or to be placed into graves, beneath beehives or foundations. Dyes were produced from berries and barks - black from walnut husks and violet from sunflower seeds - and prepared in secret, using recipes handed down from mother to daughter.
The Soviet Union attempted to eradicate the pysanky tradition. Folk artists were forced to abandon their art and museum collections of intricate pysanky were destroyed. But the tradition survived, and today thrives as a global symbol of solidarity with the Ukrainian people through the horrors of the current conflict.
When I asked my Ukrainian colleague Ansatasiia if she remembered writing her first pysanka, she thought for a moment, and said she couldn’t, because it is something she has always done. It is part of the fabric of being Ukrainian. Anastasiia feels a deep connection to Ukraine’s past and her ancestors when she writes pysanky. She knows that when she lights a candle to decorate an egg with sweet-smelling beeswax, she is continuing the work of people a thousand years past.
This year, how many eggs will go unwritten because people are no longer there to write them? How many grandmothers no longer have grandchildren to teach to write pysanky?
Anastasiia’s hometown is close to the Carpathian Mountains. From that region comes a legend of a terrible monster which personifies evil. Every year, it sends out minions to count the number of pysanky that have been written. If enough have been decorated, good will prevail over evil for another year, and the monster remains chained up. The fate of the world therefore rests on the pysanky tradition.
It was this story I thought of when I proposed the idea of this fundraising residency to City Arts, in which I will write one hundred pysanky.
Anastasiia told me that it feels amazing that people are writing pysanky for Ukraine, although it is tragic that so many of us are learning about Ukrainian culture due to the war that has so brutally destroyed normal life in her home country.
This year, how many eggs will go unwritten because people are no longer there to write them? How many grandmothers no longer have grandchildren to teach to write pysanky?
None of this evil can be undone, but organisations such as the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) are working on the ground to alleviate the present hurts. Please, support DEC and our Ukrainian friends.
If we are to stop evil prevailing, we must continue to write the world we wish to see, one egg at a time. From something fragile comes something of unbreakable power and symbolism.
100 Pysanky for Ukraine will be exhibited in the Window Gallery at City Arts from Thursday 4 August - Sunday 25 September. It was selected by the St Anns & Sneinton panel of City Arts’ RESIDENCE programme, one of five projects each selected by panels representing different communities.
All pysanky will be available to buy to raise funds for DEC. Follow City Arts for more details.
Donate to the DEC fundraiser here
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