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2022

I was born and raised in southern Ukraine in a Russian-speaking family, which was the majority in this region. But I had no opportunity to study in my native language. There were no Russian language hours in school, and Russian literature was studied within the framework of 'Foreign Literature'. 

 was small and foolish, and somehow during a Ukrainian Literature lesson I said that I liked Taras Shevchenko’s Russian novels for being written in Russian. For such sincerity, I had a constant 'C' grade in Ukrainian until the end of school. I finished school in 1998, that is, my studies fell during the 90s. My daughter also had no opportunity to study in Russian: by the time she went to school, there was only one Russian school left in the city, and it was overcrowded. At the end of her first grade when we moved to Sevastopol, she wrote the Russian 'и' like this: 'i'.

Protests in Sevastopol in 2014 began with the law banning the Russian language. And from December 30, 2016 in Ukraine, the prohibition of Russian books came into effect. It got more interesting afterwards, and in light of the special operation on June 19, 2022, the Verkhovna Rada adopted new laws. The Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine removed books by Russian authors from the school program. 

This object is a Rubik’s cube, on the faces of which are printed QR codes leading to 6 removed works. These codes are impossible to read, only by touch. But a person does not have such a scanner. And after a few rotation iterations, it will be impossible to restore the codes. Just like it will be impossible to restore the lost gaps in culture, education, and understanding. 

Nikolai Gogol 'The Overcoat' 

Vasily Bykov 'Alpine Ballad'

'Ilya Muromets and Nightingale the Robber' 

Anatoly Kuznetsov 'Babi Yar' 

Mikhail Bulgakov 'Master and Margarita' 

Fyodor Dostoevsky 'Crime and Punishment'”