On May 17, on the eve of International Museum Day and Vyshyvanka Day, the exhibition “Family Shrine” was exhibited on the territory of the Reserve. It featured shirts that Korsun families keep and are proud of.
Halyna Opalat is a true defender of her kind. Galina Ivanivna’s family keeps an old chest with family jewels: wedding towels, bright handkerchiefs, embroidered shirts. The most expensive for her are the shirts sewn and embroidered by her mother’s hands. Among them, a festive shirt with bright “brocade” roses, traditional for our area, embroidered on the sleeves, chest, and cuffs stands out. This shirt does not stay in the chest all the time. Galina Ivanovna dresses her for holidays and solemn events. Later, the youngest daughter, Vitalina, also began to wear her grandmother’s shirt. It suits both mother and daughter very well.
The age of a household heirloom often speaks of the deep spiritual traditions of the family and the strong connection of several generations of the family. Such traditions are preserved in the family of the talented Korsun poet, teacher Ludmila Bystrova-Drobot. Lyudmila Anatoliivna wore a traditional Ukrainian shirt, which may be more than 150 years old, to demonstrate the modernity of the old shirt, which became not only a family amulet, but also a festive outfit for special occasions.
Valentyna Fesenko, also a well-known poetess in the Korsun Region, keeps an ancient shrine of her family. The embroidery of the shirt is also of a bright “brocade” style. Valentina Vasylivna’s great-grandmother used to sew and embroider it.
The exhibition presents family treasures and employees of the Reserve.
Many family heirlooms from the Chigyrin region are kept by Paraskovia Stepenkina, director of the Reserve. Among them are the shirts of her grandmother Solomiya Khtodosivna Nekrasa and mother Lyubov Sydorivna Orlenko. Shirts of the first half of the 20th century impress with their exquisite cut, skillful embroidery and testify to the taste and cultural traditions of the family. Also at the exhibition is the traditional wedding dress of the bride, in which Lyubov Sydorivna got married. Paraskovia Yakivna carefully keeps the festive shirts of her father, Yakov Pavlovich, embroidered by her mother’s hands.
The exhibition features relics from the historic Poltava region, where Lidia Ovsienko, deputy director of the Reserve for scientific work, is from. This is the festive shirt and corsage of her mother, Hanna Petrivna. Hanna Petrovna embroidered the shirt and often wore it to traditional weddings, when she took an active part in the cow ceremony. And an exquisite shirt made of thin bleached home-spun cloth of the beginning of the 20th century belonged to great-grandmother Maryna Ivanivna Olefirenka. It is an example of a traditional embroidered shirt with an ancient intricate “white on white” embroidery.
We hope that the “Family Shrine” exhibition helped visitors to understand the true spiritual values of Ukrainians through material things. An embroidered shirt is a family symbol, a family shrine, a powerful amulet and an integral part of national identity. And today, embroidery is one of the symbols of resistance to the enemy during the war and symbols of faith in Victory.
The author of the exhibition is Olena Raykova, senior research associate