The children of Donetsk region visited the art camp founded by Victoria Amelina
Children from all over Donetsk region visited the camp this year.
All photos courtesy of the press office of the New York Literary Festival.
The second artistic and educational camp in the mountains for the winners and nominees of the essay contest of the New York Literary Festival (NLF) has ended. It was founded by a Ukrainian writer Victoria Amelina and created a focus topic – “Deoccupation of the future”.
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About this UP. Culture the press service of the festival reported.
In total, more than 50 texts from students of grades 9-11 were submitted to the competition. Among the authors, the jury selected about 20 participants. Those who did not make it to the camp received additional prizes – certificates for the purchase of books.
As noted by the organizers, the New York Literary Festival provides grants to the winners of the essay contest for educational courses and projects of their own choice.
“The focus topic of this year’s essay contest is “Deoccupation of the Future” – this is the slogan of the second NLF, which was invented by Vika. The festival was planned for the fall of 2022 and, of course, did not take place due to the full-scale war. We wanted teenagers to reflect on this topic in their texts. In addition, the essay contest was also expanded according to Vika’s plan– says the co-organizer Khrystyna Shevchenko.
Teenagers from New York, Bakhmut, Zvanivka, Toretsk, Svitlodarsk and Soledar came to NYCamp. They were given lectures and master classes on writing and acting skills, music and art therapy by a writer and an artist Kateryna Mikhalitsinamusician and artist, founder of the “Cake and Whip” project Maryan Pirigfilm director and screenwriter Maryna Stepanskajournalist and program director of Lviv Bookforum Sofia Chelyak.
press service of the festival
press service of the festival
press service of the festival
press service of the festival
In addition, a member of the previous camp, a New York activist Andriy Kovalchuk this year he joined the organizers of the camp and proposed a new activity. The participants were able to transfer the drawings created at the workshops to the author’s t-shirts and take them home with them at the end of the camp.
“Like last year, the camp included participants from the same city or school who saw each other in person for the first time during the full-scale invasion. Every time it is incredible emotions for them and for us. For us, the most important thing at such events is to create a space of trust and mutual support, to give teenagers the opportunity to feel a little more at home thanks to the people with whom they spend these few days in the mountains, even if their real home is far away, destroyed by the Russians. Tell them about Vika and everything she did and planned to do for Donetsk region,” – says the co-organizer of the event Olya Rusina.
How Victoria Amelina created a literary festival
Victoria Amelina – writer and public figure, member of the Ukrainian PEN, laureate of the 2014 Coronation of the Word national prize and the Joseph Conrad prize. In 2021, she was nominated for the Central European Angelus Literary Award.
It was Victoria who found the diaries in the de-occupied Kapitolivka under Ryzyum the writer Volodymyr Vakulenko, who was killed by the Russians. A printed version of Vakulenko’s diary was presented at the Book Arsenal in June, the foreword to which was written by Amelina.
Amelina at NLF 2021.
New York Literary Festival / Facebook
She founded the New York Literary Festival in 2021. Shortly before that, the small town near the occupied Horlivka was given back its historical name New York – instead of the previous name “Novgorodske”.
In January 2022, the winners of the first competition went on an educational trip to Kyiv and Lviv. Already after the beginning of the full-scale invasion, in 2023, Victoria wanted to gather the teenagers and young people of New York at a camp in the Carpathians.
“It was important for Vika that, while there is no opportunity to hold the festival in New York, his initiatives should continue and live outside of New York. It was important for her to support the Ukrainian New York community“, the project curator of the New York Literary Festival said at the time Olga Rusina.
The First New York Literary Festival.
New York Literary Festival / Facebook
On June 27, 2023, Victoria was seriously injured during Russian shelling in the center of Kramatorsk. The writer died on July 1, 2023 in the Mechnikov hospital in Dnipro.
During her lifetime, she became the author of the books “The November Syndrome”, “Home for a House”, “E-e-stories of the excavator Eka”, as well as the posthumous collection of poems “Testimony”. From the sales of the poetry collection in 2023, Ukrainian PEN, as well as friends and relatives announced fundraising for the New York Literary Festival she founded.
