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While Ukrainian diaspora artists like Arcadia Olenska- Petryshyn are enchanted by exotic landscapes, historic documents in the exhibition recall the international travels of UNWLA members who took part in the United Nations Decade of Women’s World Conferences as representatives of the World Federation of Ukrainian Women’s Organiza- tions and the National Council of Women of the United States. These women staged demonstrations, distributed information, and conducted panels in defense of women prisoners of conscience during UN Women’s Conferences in Mexico City (1975) and Copenhagen (1980). Artists Alina Tenser and Sasha Topolnytska represent a generation that came to the U.S. in the 1990s, when the UNWLA was advising global aid agencies on Ukraine’s needs in the post-Chornobyl, post-USSR era. Their works are in dialogue with the historic children’s books illus - trated by Yaroslava Surmach-Mills, which prompt stories about the UNWLA’s involvement with the International Movement of Mothers and the organization’s advocacy for vulnerable children under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989). Following on its Children of Chornobyl advocacy work in the 1990s, the UNWLA’s campaigns have focused on the return of the Ukrainian children kidnapped by russia since its full-scale invasion in 2022. UNWLA wreaths are woven from gestures of care, ap- peals against abuse, and lobbying for dignity. They are shared across the ocean to help people navigate, connect, and forge bonds with full respect for ethnic roots and cul - tural education. These traces of Ukrainian women’s activ - ism reverberate within the artworks of this exhibition. НАШЕ ЖИТТЯ • Вересень-Жовтень 2025 21 One of the UNWLA’s earliest initiatives was organizing a showcase of Ukrain - ian folk art in 1926 at the Astor Hotel in New York City as part of the fifth annual Exposition of Women’s Arts and Industries. The successful one-week presentation motivated UNWLA mem - bers to acquire additional items from artists and craftspeople in Ukraine for the Ukrainian Pavilion at the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair. The folk art objects on display in The Wreath, traditionally associated with “women’s work” — textiles, ceramics, and weaving — also have a more potent function. As the foundation of The Ukrainian Museum’s collection, they reinforce the power of ornament and operate like a capsule for the preserva- tion of Ukrainian identity. In their own time, these kilims, shirts, sashes, plates, and other decorative elements articu- lated the entrepreneurial potential and creative buoyancy of their makers. Bridging the production, study, and promotion of vernacular art are the pedagogical endeavors championed by, among others, Olena Kulchytska (1877–1967), who travelled around Ukraine on foot to document these expressions of visual culture and to systematize, publish, and transfer this knowledge further through her teach- ing. Through their work as ambassa- dors of new aesthetic concepts in na - tional art, Ukrainian women abroad in the early 20th century exemplified the emerging global shift towards the “new woman” archetype — one that rep- resented a more independent female identity and cared about increasing its visibility by forming its own networks and institutions. About The Wreath’s Folk Art Items Curator Lilia Kudelia leads visitors on a tour of the exhibition The Wreath. Soyuzianky showcasing Ukrainian folk art at the Astor Hotel exhibition, New York, 1926.
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