A light table, sand, music, tragic history and a phenomenal artist

Published by in creativity, digitalstorytelling, globalvoices on June 27th, 2009

Karyn Romeis posted a Russian langauge YouTube video to her blog today. Although I do not yet speak any Russian, the artist communicates a powerful story here in an amazing way which transcends language.

What is the backstory? Is this the German invasion of Russia during World War II? What ARE the words of the singers? I am enthralled and want to learn more. I need to reach out to Russian language speakers.

One of my USAFA classmates speaks Russian and lives here in DC. If I’m able to meet up with him this week I’m going to ask about this. Actually I think I’ll email him too. :-)

If you have any further info on the backstory of this video, please let me know.

This is a phenomenal example of passionate, artistic expression. At times it reminds me of a multimedia Guernica.

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On this day..

7 Comments »
  • Jane Kraut

    Amazing, thanks for sharing.

  • Erich Lantz

    I did a little sleuthing on Google… this video is apparently from a Ukrainian TV show called “Ukraine has Talent,” so the language is most likely Ukrainian (not Russian). The artist’s name is Xenia Simonova, and the content is concerned with WWII in Ukraine.

    http://www.pixarplanet.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5067

  • http://karynromeis.blogspot.com Karyn Romeis

    When you get the translation for the songs, please pass them on.

    @Erich Russian is about as widely spoken in Ukraine as Ukranian, possibly even more so – see this site. It isn’t really necessary to do any sleuthing to discover the name of the programme, it’s attached to the original video on YouTube.

  • http://www.wesfryer.com Wesley Fryer

    Thanks for doing and sharing the detective work – how did you confirm the content is about WWII, Erich? Without any language knowledge that was the impression I got from watching it, but I’m wondering if you found confirmation elsewhere?

  • http://www.wesfryer.com Wesley Fryer

    Here is what my friend who speaks fluent Russian wrote me via email about this video:

    The video is from the Ukrainian TV Show – Ukraine has Talent. It is called a Requiem in the Sand by Ksenia Simonova. The girl starts by drawing a village and two people on a bench. Then the announcer uses the actual radio announcement of the German attack on the USSR on 22 Jun 41. It is followed by a Russian song about a quiet night during the war. It is followed by an instrumental score and then another Soviet song about soldiers that died for the Motherland. The final instrumental score shows a girl looking through the window and seeing a shadow of her sailor husband. The child puts his hand on the window and she writes “you are always close by. “

  • http://karynromeis.blogspot.com Karyn Romeis

    Thanks for that. I’m going to add that information to my own post about it. So much sadder than I realised. I thought she was looking out of the window and her husband had unexpectedly come home!

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