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18 “НАШЕ ЖИТТЯ”, ЛЮТИЙ 2011 UKRAINIAN EXHIBIT AT PEARL S. BUCK HOUSE TAKES FIRST PRIZE by Chrystyna Prokopovych From a very young age, I learned from my parents a sense of duty to Ukraine — because the Communist government in Ukraine was destroying the Ukrainian languag e and culture, it was our responsibility to keep the language and culture thriving here in the United States and it was imperative that we teach others about Ukraine. If I ever complained about doing something “Ukrainian” or asked why I had to do it, my mo ther’s answer was “Ukraina tobi toho nikoly ne zabude” (Ukraine will always remember that you did this). As an adult, even though I know Ukraine has little (or no) knowledge of what we do here, I still feel that it is my duty to do my best to represent Ukr aine among non - Ukrainians. Fortunately, I have a job that makes this feasible (and sometimes, even mandatory). As curator of the Ukrainian Heritage Studies Center at Manor College, I am often asked to do presentations or provide small displays on various Ukrainian topics. Most often such presen - tations deal with general information about Ukraine or Ukrainian folk art. I am always eager to take part in these events because refusing to do so would be like denying my heritage. Last November Barbara Ozer, the Executive Secretary to the president of Manor College approached me with an idea. She had just been to the Pearl S. Buck House (which is a museum/shrine dedicated to the famous author and which is located in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, not too far from wh ere I live and work) and found out that they have a Festival of Trees during the holiday season. Each room in the house is decorated by different groups, schools, and professional decorators, and Barbara thought it would be great if we could decorate one r oom with Ukrainian folk art. This was a great opportunity, but way too late for 2009. In May of 2010, however, Barbara con - tacted the curator of the Pearl S. Buck House and was able to secure a spot for Ukrainian folk art for the 2010 festival. I was thri lled, and Barbara and I visited the house to see which room of those still available would be most suitable. We listed the three best rooms as good, better, and best; submitted our request, and were eventually notified that we had been given our “best” cho ice — one half of the dining room. The space was great and so was being notified in July, because this gave us plenty of time to prepare and we would not be doing things last minute. We soon received a list of the rules and requirements for our display. The house itself is a museum, and all the furniture and things in the house are historic artifacts that need to be handled with care or not handled at all. In view of this, I realized that putting together an exhibit would be harder than I originally imagined. Moreover, since the festival was scheduled to run for a month and a half, my original idea of setting up a table with the “Sviata Vecheria” would not work. Obviously, displaying real food was out of the question, and who knows where to buy plastic vushka. Now I was getting nervous. Realizing that I needed help, my first move was to turn to my fellow members of UNWLA Branch 88. At our next branch meeting, I mentioned the project and everyone was very interested. So we started hashing out ideas, and members volunteered their embroideries, ornaments, and Ukrainian Teddy Bears for the extended exhibit. For the tree decorations, I turned to the “Manorly Bead Club.” This is a club that meets once a month at the UHSC/Manor College to work on and share ideas about beadwork, an outgrowth of the gerdany classes held at Manor. Although some of the beadwork design is not strictly traditional, club members use the materials and stitches used in traditional gerdany. Luckily, the UHSC and Branch 88 have worked together on projects in the past (an embroidery exhibit in 2008 and a pysanky exhibit in 2009), so I knew we would work well together. The big problem was that we would only have a few hours at the house to put the display together. To make sure we were ready for thi s race against time, we even put a tree up at the UHSC first. We decorated it to see how it would look, then took it apart to transport it to the Pearl S. Buck house. On set - up day I met Barbara Ozer and three members of Br. 88: Renya Ciuk, Ulana Prociuk, and Christine Shwed, who all took the day off from work to help decorate. The people at the Pearl S. Видання C оюзу Українок A мерики - перевидано в електронному форматі в 2012 році . A рхів C У A - Ню Йорк , Н . Й . C Ш A.
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