Hunting song

Ada Rybachuk, 1957–1958
Canvas, tempera

A man has gone out hunting.

He is alone. No one around but the reindeer and the dogs. And all around him — landscapes and the northern lights. This is the Tundra…

And all of nature is against him.

His song is about what he sees around him. And this song has no end. It ends only when sleep overcomes him. And all around is snow… And the snow protects him. Because his song is a talisman. Through it, he becomes one with nature.

Volodymyr Melnichenko

The world was white — pale white, white-white. More than anything, it resembled water in which brushes had been rinsed after using white paint.

We stood at the bottom of this dissolved white world and had no idea which way to go. Did directions even exist here, any points of the compass at all? It was hard to breathe in all that whiteness. But there was no fear. Only bewilderment.

What had happened?..

Where had the world around us gone?

Where had... the world gone?..

Here we repaired the sledges. Here, digging logs out of the sand, we gathered firewood. Remember, that time when we didn’t have a single log left?

Right here... remember?..

Letting the old man walk ahead, I drew his figure as it grew smaller and smaller in the distance. Slowly, he trod a path through the snow. And apart from him, the only thing that lived and moved was the low sun — without rays, without light.

Ada Rybachuk