Latest news with #Marharyta
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Eleven Ukrainian children evacuated from occupation, including daughter of Azovstal defender freed after three years in captivity
Eleven children have been brought from Russian-occupied territories to areas under Ukrainian control, among them two orphans and children of Ukrainian service members. Source: Ukrainian charitable organisation Save Ukraine Anatolii, a teenage orphan, was among those evacuated from the temporarily occupied territories. He had suffered physical abuse at the hands of Russian soldiers after he found bullets in the forest. Anatolii was abducted in the middle of a school lesson, a bag was put over his head in the headteacher's office, his hands were tied and he was taken to a basement. A week before his 18th birthday, he received a summons for conscription into Russian forces. Another evacuee was Ostap, who had not seen his family for three years. His father serves in the Ukrainian Armed Forces and his older brother has spent 1,111 days in Russian captivity. Among those rescued was the daughter of a female Azov defender. The girl's mother, Marharyta, and older brother spent three years in Russian captivity. Back in 2022, Marharyta and her son had left the Azovstal steel plant together without knowing what had happened to each other until their release in April 2025. Quote from Save Ukraine: "During the prisoner exchange, Marharyta accidentally encountered her son on the bus. But she had one more dream – to see her little girl again, who had remained in occupation as a baby. Today, that dream has come true: the mother is finally reunited with her children and still can't believe it's not a dream." Read more: Separated by war: Ukrainian soldier reunited with daughter after release from Russian captivity Support Ukrainska Pravda on Patreon!
Yahoo
29-04-2025
- Yahoo
Girl with eyes full of life: 12-year-old schoolgirl killed in Russian UAV attack on Dnipropetrovsk Oblast
A 12-year-old girl was killed in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast as a result of a Russian attack on the night of 28-29 April. A UAV hit her family's house. The girl's six-year-old sister and parents were injured. Source: Suspilne. Dnipro Details: The tragedy occurred in the Hubynykha hromada. The victim was a student of a local lyceum, Marharyta Titarenko. [A hromada is an administrative unit designating a village, several villages, or a town, and their adjacent territories – ed.] As the girl's grandmother Mariia told Suspilne Dnipro, a pillar fell on her granddaughter as a result of a UAV hit. At the time, Marharyta was sleeping in a room on the first floor. When rescue workers pulled her out of the rubble, she was still alive. "It's just beyond words. What could that child have been guilty of? What were they targeting here, if there were civilians living here? I came over on Sunday, and she was quiet, as if she felt it. Ritochka was downstairs. If it wasn't for the pillar, maybe the child would have survived," the woman says. Mariia says that Marharyta's parents and her younger sister were sleeping on the second floor. They were taken to hospital for examination because of their injuries. The woman said that Marharyta used to sing and dance and was a good student. "She sang very beautifully and danced... Her mother is a teacher, so she was smart beyond her age. She also excelled in mathematics. In fact, in everything," Mariia recalls. Marharyta was a good student and a creative child. Photo: Yuliia Tarasova-Cherniavska on Facebook The girl's neighbours and classmates came to the scene to help. "She was very kind, friendly, and helped everyone. Most people praised her; she was a good student. She loved mathematics and the Ukrainian language. She loved all subjects," said Kateryna, a classmate of Marharyta. A friend of the girl, Kira, said that she had last seen her at school the day before her death. "I can't believe it happened... We were at school just yesterday, and now it's over," the girl said. Yuliia Tarasova-Cherniavska, a teacher at the Hubynykha Lyceum, said that Marharyta was active and often participated in various events. "Since kindergarten, the girl has been growing up talented. At the lyceum, she was a winner of art and academic competitions, and an active participant in events at the community centre. We will remember Marharyta as a bright, sweet, kind, well-mannered, sociable, friendly girl," she wrote. The house after the UAV hit. Photo: Dnipropetrovsk Oblast Military Administration Head Serhii Lysak on Telegram "Talented, bright, creative... An innocent angel. Everyone remembers Marharyta's performances in our institution. It is impossible to put into words the feeling of loss. A charming girl with eyes full of life... Forever in our memory and in the hearts of everyone who knew her," the local Palace of Culture said on its website. The Hubynykha hromada declared two days of mourning on 29 and 30 April. "Words cannot express the depth of our grief. This tragedy is another terrible testament to the cruelty of the aggressor, who stops at nothing in its criminal war against Ukraine," the post reads. Background: On 28 April, Kyiv bid farewell to the family of 17-year-old Danylo Khudei, who was killed in a large-scale Russian attack on the night of 23-24 April along with his parents, Viktoriia and Oleh. Support Ukrainska Pravda on Patreon!
Yahoo
11-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
'With honor and weapon in hand' — artist Marharyta Polovinko killed on front line defending Ukraine
Artist Marharyta Polovinko could have spent her life creating art that challenged, provoked, and illuminated viewers had Russia not invaded Ukraine. Instead, she joined the Armed Forces of Ukraine. A rising star in Ukraine's contemporary art scene, Polovinko made the decision to enlist in late 2024, channeling the same passion that drove her art into the defense of her country. The war shaped not only how she lived, but how she created art — many of her wartime-related pieces were made with her own blood. On April 5, at just 31, Polovinko was killed in the Kharkiv direction of the front. She is mourned by those who fought beside her in the 2nd Mechanized Battalion of the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade and by those who knew her as an artist whose creative voice was just coming into its own. "Marharyta was an extremely important artist for our time. She is already part of art history. The way she felt this world — its beauty and its pain at once — may be difficult to ever fully convey. But I'll try, again and again," friend and fellow artist Dasha Chechushkova told the Kyiv Independent. "Her work speaks volumes. Her language was exquisitely concise. She was a great artist. But it must also be remembered that she died a soldier." Prior to the full-scale war, Polovinko's art was rooted in exploring the lives of those who are marginalized or exist on the fringes of society. As with many Ukrainian artists, the war heavily influenced how she approached her work. "It was at the beginning of the full-scale war that she truly found her voice as an artist," friend and fellow artist Nikita Kadan told the Kyiv Independent. "And paradoxically, just as Marharyta's art reached maturity, her choices to volunteer and serve began to leave less and less room for artistic practice." For Polovinko, making art during wartime became a way to process what was previously unthinkable — if she "couldn't take" the latest news, then she drew it, as she said in an interview to Ukrainian media outlook Artslooker in 2023. In an untitled 2022 sketch shared on her Instagram in early April 2022, Polovinko portrays the corpse of a Russian soldier with elongated arms and a contorted body. The corpse's open jacket reveals his internal organs, which two puppies are eating, while a mother dog watches on. The sketch illustrates how, despite the devastation inflicted upon Ukraine by Russian forces, they are ultimately no match for the enduring power of nature. In time, nature reclaims, heals, and finds a way to keep going even in the wake of destruction. "Drawing is (a) primitive (act), not in the sense that it is simple, but in the sense that it happens intuitively, 'by impulse.' It became a lifeline for me," Polovinko explained to Artslooker. Polovinko also used her own blood to create a number of her artworks. In one untitled piece shared on her Instagram in late March 2024, a man points a gun at a skeleton, both seated beneath a barren tree. "I would like to give people the opportunity to erase the blood from these works so that only a stain that cannot be washed out remains." Their surroundings beyond the barren tree are barely discernible, compelling the viewer to focus on the contrast between the two figures. It is a raw, visceral depiction of Ukraine's struggle for survival — a literal battle waged between life and death. By using her own blood, Polovinko transformed herself into a conduit of Ukrainians' collective pain in the war, infusing her art with a raw, bodily truth that echoes the suffering of the Ukrainian people. "I would like to give people the opportunity to erase the blood from these works so that only a stain that cannot be washed out remains," Polovinko told the Czech media outlet Secondary Archive in 2024. "When I start to paint, the blood is bright red. Just like the memory of trauma. Then the work fades, becomes brown or even green. The memory of the trauma also remains, but its saturation, its color changes. If something bad happens, we immediately want to cancel it. But over time, it becomes our experience, and we want to keep that." Polovinko's path to joining the Armed Forces of Ukraine began through her volunteer work. Following the start of the full-scale war, Polovinko, like countless other Ukrainians, supported the military through fundraising efforts. She also took part in volunteer efforts like rescuing animals in Kherson Oblast and helping to rebuild homes devastated by shelling in both Mykolaiv and Kherson oblasts. As the war dragged on, her commitment to aiding the war effort deepened. For a year and a half, she volunteered as a combat medic to evacuate the wounded from the front line. In the autumn of 2024, she became a drone operator in the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade. Though her family and friends worried about her, they understood how much enlisting meant to her — and above all, they wanted to support her choice. "We always knew this was going to be the next step — she mentioned thinking about enlisting for a while, so we were well prepared when it happened," her sister Anhelina told the Kyiv Independent. "Despite the worry, I understood that it was her choice — and that, in her case, it couldn't have been any other way. My reaction was only to support her," Chechushkova added. "Marharyta truly was a warrior — for life, for freedom. The strength, calm, decisiveness, and courage she radiated — that is and was the real beauty of life." Polovinko's loved ones said that she was consumed by an overwhelming need to act, to push back against the injustice of Russia's war unfolding around her. As fellow artist Katya Buchatska recalled in a post on Instagram, Polovinko "worried that all the (country's) best people would die and Ukraine would once again fall into a cyclical decline." Polovinko was, after all, part of a generation that had come of age under the long shadow of Russia's war, which began in 2014 with the illegal annexation of Crimea and the invasion of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts. Polovinko was killed on April 5 in the Kharkiv direction and laid to rest in her hometown of Kryvyi Rih on April 11. Those who knew her will remember not only her artistic talent but also her deep compassion and unwavering dedication to helping others. "She had to act, to stand against the terror. Because Marharyta truly was a warrior — for life, for freedom. The strength, calm, decisiveness, and courage she radiated — that is and was the real beauty of life," Chechushkova said. "And it remains an inspiration, even now, in these dark April days, without her." The 2nd Mechanized Battalion of the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade, where she served as a combat medic, also hailed her as a "true warrior," writing in a eulogy published online on April 9 that she died "with honor and weapon in hand." Read also: Ukrainian author Oksana Zabuzhko on why Ukrainians 'don't have to respect Pushkin' We've been working hard to bring you independent, locally-sourced news from Ukraine. Consider supporting the Kyiv Independent.
