TRISTIA / AROUND EXODUS

In AD 8, Ovid – a Roman poet was banished to Tomis, on the Black Sea, by the exclusive intervention of the Emperor Augustus. This event shaped all his following poetry. Ovid wrote that the reason for his exile was carmen et error – “a poem and a mistake”, claiming that his crime was more harmful than poetry.
In exile, Ovid wrote – Tristia, which illustrated his sadness and desolation.The Tristia (“Sorrows” or “Lamentations”) is a collection of letters written in elegiac couplets.

In 2022/23 Sami and Siergiej – two exile artists talk about their experience of leaving their home towns – Damascus and Kyiv. Following the example of Tristia elegies, they remember their last night at home, the object they left behind, friends and family. They also talk about their new artistic ventures.

Tristia / Around Exodus
Katarzyna Wińska (May/June 2022)
Three elegies based on recordings with Sergei Verenich,
an architecture painter, an exile from Kyiv (following the Russian attack on Ukraine)
in May 2022 in Warsaw, at the cafe at the Academy of Fine Arts

Elegy 1

“The Last Night in Kyiv”
The thing is, there was no time to wonder what to take;
I was rounded up by friends – already packed for the road;
My wife, daughter and I had an hour, maybe two to get ready
we got our passports and I asked my wife if I shouldn’t
take the papers showing my Verenich-Stachowski noble lineage
(you can look it up on Wikipedia.) I thought I’d show them.
At the embassy, the legation, but I can’t speak Polish:
maybe better to play the artist card?
To navigate our new situation, our new country…
In the beginning, a blank canvas, to tell it more precisely
to tell it from the beginning of the war? … I’d rather not talk about it…

There’s a story with my elder brother, always there behind me
then he went to the Military Academy in the town of Pushkin, near Leningrad.
He visited on holidays, brought us Stones records
told us all about the gigs he saw
Went in depth about Polish musicians: about Skaldy about Niemen –
they were a big deal to me. But soon he grew out of it.
In the summer, after the fourth year, he came back to Donbas
we were sitting in front of the TV, watching sports.
My brother didn’t say much. My father could tell we were growing apart.
He asked: Listen Vitya, as a future elite officer, what do you think
About the sorry state of the government? They’ll get us nowhere;
they call themselves heroes, they award themselves bonuses…
I, the younger brother, expected a firm response
but I got the classic Soviet buffoonery; to Father, always our compass,
for how to live, be objective, know history,
to that same father he said: Don’t ask useless questions
they’re doing what they have to, it’s none of our business…
As I recall it now, that foreshadowed
the disaster that would fall between us.

Elegy 2

“An Object Left in a House in Kyiv”
My paintings stayed at home, in Kyiv, twelve km from Bucha
Some Poles, here in Warsaw, asked for one from a gallery online
But because of the war I couldn’t deliver it to them
I’m repainting it, the same subject, with new energy
I haven’t got a studio here – I’m painting in an attic
on easels borrowed from a friend’s child.
The picture is mostly yellow and blue, like the original
I hate to repeat myself; I look for new inspiration
I listen to the clients, like when I work as an architect;
I saw pictures in their home; their taste isn’t bad
But now they want a historical feel to it;
They chose a castle in Olesko where Polish magnates once lived
One became a king; their choice was aesthetic and moral,
seven years ago I called the picture “between heaven and earth”;
space is the protagonist – the castle is just a pretext;
it’ll be a castle, as they want it, but my intention stays;
what I paint is composed on rock ballads
I search for music in the structures of castles and churches
I seal it in the proportions, textures and colors,
I break the mold and embrace the abstract
it begins with eyeing the object.
In my pictures impressions of buildings from centuries past;
traces of old harmonies give me mystical signs.
My pictures have no people; I don’t mean to create tributes,
when I paint I am one-on-one with the space
But the castle in Olesko still speaks to me;
Its “Ogoncik” emblem – part of two pictures there
– was also my family crest.

Elegy 3

“Epitaph”

I thought I was wasting time at the architecture department
taking worthless courses in building supervision
But a friend helped me see the light; you met a mentor in those classes!
And though you could have been drawing more, exploring art history
a professor appeared – Yuri Himich; a star to guide your way
– life brought me a teacher – a Ukrainian genius.
He didn’t take me by the hand: you know what’s right, paint as you wish, he said
After Dad’s funeral I returned to Kyiv to see him
He was Dad’s peer, so I took the leap:
Yuri Ivanovich, take my father’s place, please
He agreed: I’m with you –
it was our spiritual understanding

I dedicated this picture to Vysotsky. It’s called “In the Circle of Light” –
a chunk of the cosmos – you can turn it whatever way you like
They rejected it for the Republican exhibition – a member of the jury said:
we don’t need a modernist here – he made it sound like fascist or onanist
only in Kyiv can one be told this

I’m over sixty – here in Poland I’m trying to find my feet.