Art auction closing and presentation of nineteen original new icons by Ukrainian artists Sonia Atlantova & Olexander Klimenko from their celebrated Icons on Ammunition Boxes project. The new set premiered exclusively online on GalaBid (https://app.galabid.com/icons/register). The original icons arrived from Kyiv on the eve of this event and will be on display during the event.
All proceeds from sale will benefit the Pirogov First Volunteer Mobile Hospital (PFVMH)) – a non-governmental organization of healthcare professionals in Ukraine who volunteer their services to provide medical care on the frontline of the current war against Russian invasion. Since its inception in 2014, the Pirogov Mobile Volunteer Hospital treated about 50,000 patients, saving lives of both military and civilians.
The icons are painted on wooden fragments from military ammunition boxes abandoned by Russian soldiers on the battle fields in Eastern Ukraine, found by Ukrainian deminers and rescued by medical volunteers from the Pirogov First Volunteer Mobile Hospital. These icons transform the military rubbish smelling of death into life-affirming art. Images painted on these boxes bring hope for peace and justice to the country torn by war. They epitomize how violence and pain can be transformed into peace and consolation and serve as an important source of financial support to the Pirogov First Volunteer Mobile Hospital to make such transformation possible.
Icons on Ammunition Boxes have been exhibited at the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium, Parliaments of Ukraine and Lithuania, St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv, Kyiv Pechersk Lavra, and the Lithuanian Embassy in Ukraine as well as in many cities in Ukraine, Poland, Germany, France, Holland, Italy, Austria, Czech Republic, Canada and US. Since 2015, Icons on Ammunition Boxes project raised over $450,000 for the Pirogov First Volunteer Mobile Hospital.
“No gold. No gemstones.This icon has been painted on three planks of knotty wood: the planks of an ammunition box recovered from the devastated Kyiv suburb of Bucha, Out of Bucha’s mass graves, in the wake of terrifying Russian atrocities against civilians, something new has come …an image of mourning and resolve, of horror and courage, of a culture that will not give up.” __Jason Farago, The War in Ukraine Is the True Culture War, The New York Times, July 17, 2022
