Prints size 95x125 cm
No matter how much we dream that life after our victory will return to pre-war realities, this will not happen. We will face quite many challenges and, unlike the acute phase of the war, when the enemy comes from outside and retreats, the new struggle will be internal, even intracranial, in many ways more difficult. It is worth, first of all, to prepare ourselves for the harsh reality of encountering with people who have returned from Hell, which they will undoubtedly bring along. To prevent yesterday's cute kittie-soldiers, which we idealize, from turning into aggressive and suicidal pigs, we will have to learn to accept them not so much and not only as heroes, but as people who have experienced severe emotional trauma. Be very attentive to their emotional state, avoid rapid movements, loud sounds, warn about our intentions and actions, avoid conflicts and emotional stress, do not press with conversations and advices, support their faith. It is very important for them to feel safe, so they will control everything and categorically divide others into “friends” and “aliens”. They will go a long way of healing and adaptation to a peaceful life and we have to find application for our gratitude and guilt (unfortunately, it exists) for their sacrifice - to become patient, attentive and caring. Then, perhaps, we will recognize and help ourselves - people who have experienced severe emotional trauma. Because every child, threatened to be taken to orphanage, in whose eyes the father beats the mother, or who witnessed how either of the parents, after the scandal, packs up and leaves home, experiences no less severe trauma than a soldier under artillery fire. Fragments of broken crockery or a glass vase shattered on mother's head are as deadly as shell fragments, and the blood sipping from her head is more frightening than a severe wound, and leaves scars deeper than the death of a best friend. The question “How are you?”asked for a first time at contemporary art exhibition this summer should have been asked a long time ago. When I hear Vakarchuk's singing: "Until the adulthood, everyone is a veteran here...", I understand that these words were and will be relevant before the start of the war and long after it’s end. Even for those who managed to escape it. Because from generation to generation, traumatized children raise traumatized children. Veterans raise veterans. No matter how strange it may sound now, but wars begin in families, and not in headquarters or offices. In families they end. When we ask ourselves why some people manage to maintain integrity in the realities of war, while others do not, the answer will have to be sought in childhood memories. Along with many other very important answers. All of us who did not happen to be born in conditions favorable for maturity will have to give birth to ourselves again. At 30, 40 or 80 years old. Or hand over all traumas to the children to deal with.
