The confrontation of Russia and Ukraine through culture

The invasion of Ukraine by Russia It is the latest chapter in a deep political and geographical confrontation that has been widely reflected in film and literature but has transcended international relations to affect many cultural issues.

While such a renowned filmmaker as Sergei Loznitsa (Belarussian by birth but Ukrainian by adoption) has dedicated a large part of his work as a documentary filmmaker to talking about the confrontation between Ukraine and Russia, the differences have crossed the border of the ideological and have reached music and even a soup.

Loznitsa, the great Ukrainian storyteller of the 21st century

One of the most solid documentary filmmakers on the current scene is Loznitsa, whose most important work is a fiction feature film, “Donbass” (2018), in which he portrays the absurdities of war and which is made up of 13 chapters that narrate the confrontation from in 2014 between the Ukrainian Army and the pro-Russian separatist militias of that homonymous region.

In “Maidan” (2014), Loznitsa used the images, without narration, to film the protests that began in November 2013 in Kiev against the then president, Viktor Yanukovych, and that would lead to bloody battles between the protesters and the Police.

The filmmaker planted his camera, in a fixed shot, to let reality turn into images, in an attempt to show the fragile situation in his country.

“Current Russian politicians have the same expansionist plans, I find it curious that in Europe nobody has realized the threat, Europe is ignoring that the threat is real,” Loznitsa said on a recent visit to Madrid.

Literature, the main instrument of narration

The conflict has also been reflected in literature, according to the writer born in Ukraine and resident in Spain, Dimas Prychyslyy, winner of the 25 Primaveras de Novela Award, who stands out as one of the most relevant authors who has addressed this issue to the poet, Ukrainian novelist, essayist and translator Serhij Zhadán.

It is in his book “The Orphanage” (2017), where Zhadán tells a devastating story of the struggle of civilians caught up in the conflict in eastern Ukraine, a crude novel in which he tells the story of a Ukrainian language teacher who , when hostile soldiers invade a neighboring town, he leaves for the orphanage where his nephew Sasha lives, now in occupied territory, to bring the boy home.

Also, from a more historical point of view, bestselling author Vasyl Shklyar addresses the issue in “The Black Crow,” where he discusses the 1920 insurrection against the Red Army during the Ukrainian War of Independence, a novel in which It was based on the 2019 film of the same name directed by Taras Tkachenko.

“Ukrainian notebooks”, an essential Italian comic

The Italian Igort delves into the biographies of the survivors of the “holodomor” in “Ukrainian Notebooks” (Non-Sense, 2011), whose approximate translation would be “to starve to death”, a noun that has gone down in history as “the Ukrainian genocide” .

Between 1932 and 1933, the USSR caused a criminal famine in the Republic of Ukraine. The peasants had rejected the collectivization promoted by Moscow, which in retaliation confiscated the food reserves of millions of Ukrainians.

The situation led to the death of a quarter of the country’s population. A holocaust that, according to the Italian artist, “remains a taboo subject.”

And from the hand of Igort, and after visiting Ukraine, Russia and Siberia for several years, is “Ukrainian and Russian Notebooks”, a work (Salamandra, 2014) where he collected what was already published in the previous comic and added the murder of the journalist and Russian activist Anna Politkóvskaya in 2006.

Eurovision, a competition not only musical

The rivalry between the two countries has often come to the fore in the Eurovision showcase. This same year, the Ukrainian Alina Pash won the preselection of her country, but after her victory she was accused of having traveled to Crimea without the corresponding permit. Although she denied it, the pressure made her end up giving in to her and she did not represent the country in Turin.

It was not the first time something similar had happened. In 2019, Ukrainian public TV declined to participate in the festival after the winner of that year’s preselection and one of the favorites of “eurofans” for victory in Eurovision, Maruv, refused to cancel their concerts on Russian soil. .

Ukraine had known victory in the contest very recently, in 2016. Although songs with a political message are prohibited, Jamala was allowed to compete with her song “1944″ for narrating a historical event, the deportation of thousands of Crimean Tatars. , something that violated Russia, even more after his victory.

Precisely the following year’s edition took place in a nerve center of this combat, the port of Odessa, and Ukraine, as the host country, blocked the participation of the Russian representative, Yulia Samoylova, by prohibiting her entry for having entered Crimea for two years. before “illegally” to participate in a concert.

And the fight reaches the soup

Even gastronomy reflects the permanent tension between the two countries, mainly staged by the ‘borsch’ soup, whose authorship and representativeness are disputed by the two.

In fact, Ukraine asked UNESCO in 2021 for its recognition as intangible cultural heritage to put an end to the debate on the nationality of this preparation based on beets, cabbage, potatoes, tomato, meat and smetana (sour cream).

The 700-page dossier of the candidacy, whose opinion is expected next year, indicates that as early as 1548 there is evidence of a borsch market near Kiev, and that it has been the Ukrainian emigrants who have made it known in the world; from Russia, contrary to this recognition, it is alleged that neither Russia nor Ukraine existed when it was created, but the Slavic kingdom of Kievan Rus.

Of peasant origin, the ‘borsch’ reached the Russian imperial court, being one of the favorite dishes of Tsars Alexander II and Catherine II, and even into space, intubated as part of the diet of the Russian crew members of the International Space Station .