Olexander Klimenko | Jesus Christ – SOLD
$3,000.00
OLEXANDER KLIMENKO
Jesus Christ, 2022
Tempera on wood from ammunition boxes abandoned by Russian soldiers on battle fields near Kyiv and rescued by Ukrainian deminers.
61 x 36.5cm | 24 x 14.4 in
Icon as an art form was born with the birth of Jesus Christ depicting His life against the Old Testament ban on images. Icon became the testimony of life, death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ. In our case, the emphasis of testimony is transferred from the theological and liturgical contexts to the context of witnessing the horrors of the Russian-Ukrainian war.The boards on which the icons are painted become silent witnesses of this war, since they arrived from the front, and the faces of the saints turn into witnesses of the crimes committed by the aggressor. Jesus Christ is perceived as a judge who will judge crimes in Bucha, Borodyanka, Andreevka and other villages and cities of Ukraine. The cartridge box fragment on which the icon is painted belonged to the Russian military. In it, they kept weapons with which they killed the Ukrainians. Now the attribute of death has been turned into a symbol of life and resurrection – this is how the icon is perceived in many regions of Ukraine even today….
© Olexander Klimenko
From 2015, Ukrainian artists Sonia Atlantova and Olexander Klimenko have been using wooden fragments from ammunition boxes abandoned by Russian soldiers on the battle fields in Ukraine to paint icons and donating all sale proceeds to mobile hospitals that provide urgent medical care to wounded Ukrainian soldiers and civilians. Since Russia began its invasion of Ukraine in late February, 2022, their work remains more relevant than ever.