Svitlana Koval

In an effort to perpetuate its ideology, the Soviet authorities filled the cities and villages of Ukraine with propaganda sculptures, frescoes, and mosaics. Over time, the style of some authors transformed from realism to formalism. But they still had to balance between the fulfillment of the party's order and the embodiment of universal plots. The majestic works of one of the monumental artists Ivan Lytovchenko are now slowly being destroyed under the influence of forces of nature and radiation on the buildings of the once young and flourishing, but now abandoned city of Prypiat. Numerous works and other authors of the past century still shape the space of Ukrainian cities and villages. What is it like to be a formalist artist in a totalitarian system? Does the monumental legacy of the Soviet Union have the right to be preserved in today's independent Ukraine?

A story about Ukrainian monumental art of the Soviet period in Mariupol. Photographer Stanislav Ivanov lived in Mariupol all his life. He studied history, streets, houses, monumental art. Some of the mosaics are more than half a century old. The "Tree of Life" panel - created by a team of artists led by Alla Gorska and Viktor Zaretsky - was bricked up after the death of the artist and reopened in 2008. This and other stories were collected by Stanislav Ivanov and art critic Oleksandr Chernov in the album "All Shades of Mariupol Mosaics". After February 24, 2022, the mosaicists, like hundreds of thousands of residents of Mariupol, became hostages of the occupying forces of the Russian Federation. In the film, we are transported to peaceful Mariupol in December 2021 and, together with Stanislav, explore the city and its mosaics, transported to a place where time and the elements seemed to be the greatest threats.

This documentary is a portrait of several residents in a remote region of Ukraine. They dream of sunken treasures, sing in a village choir, fight raiders and design coffins for themselves - in short, they live a normal Ukrainian life.