This is incredible: "The winner of 'Ukraine’s Got Talent', Kseniya Simonova"

This is about 8 minutes long, (if your computer is "upper to snuff" than mine) but it is well worth watching when you have the time. Worth watching! One of the best videos I seen to date: (If ever there was a work of art that captured the cultural angst of the effects of socialism on a conquered population, this gives silent voice to why, at every turn, we must resist, with all force necessary, any effort to subjugate responsibly expressed individual, cultural and national freedoms for the "good of the collective". If you'll notice, not only the audience's reaction, but also the reaction of the announcer as well to this most powerful piece of performance art go far beyond mere words. How can I say this more strongly? Imagine "The Diary of Ann Frank" times an entire nations cultural memory, yet reduced to its essence. She, through her art and this gift, are absolutely incredible. Something more powerful speaks through her, as it does through all true artists'. She creates, discards and recreates numerous images, each worthy of capturing and framing in its own right, at a pace that is phenomenal. Who am I to make such lofty observations? Just an old git-fiddle player that now drives big trucks and used to take pictures for a living in the service. Someone who has lived a full life in association with and blessed by some of the most talented, caring people on the planet. Hopefully, some of it rubbed off.)  

  

. . .first, please, read this all the way through…  

  

This video shows the winner of "Ukraine’s Got Talent," Kseniya Simonova, 24, drawing a series of pictures on an illuminated sand table showing how ordinary people were affected by the German invasion during World War II. Her talent, which admittedly is a strange one, is mesmeric to watch.  

  

The images, projected onto a large screen, moved many in the audience to tears, and she won the top prize of about £75,000.  

  

She begins by creating a scene showing a couple, sitting holding hands on a bench under a starry sky, but then warplanes appear, and the happy scene is obliterated.  

  

It is replaced by a woman’s face crying, but then a baby arrives, and the woman smiles again. Once again, war returns, and Miss Simonova throws the sand into chaos from which a young woman’s face appears.  

She quickly becomes an old widow, her face wrinkled and sad, before the image turns into a monument to an Unknown Soldier.  

  

This outdoor scene becomes framed by a window as if the viewer is looking out on the monument from within a house.  

  

In the final scene, a mother and child appear inside, and a man standing outside, with his hands pressed against the glass, saying goodbye.  

  

The Great Patriotic War, as it is called in Ukraine, resulted in one in four of the population’s being killed, with eight to 11 million deaths out of a population of 42 million.  

  

Kseniya Simonova says: "I find it difficult enough to create art using paper and pencils or paintbrushes, but using sand and fingers is beyond me. The art, especially when the war is used as the subject matter, even brings some audience members to tears. And, there’s surely no bigger compliment."  

  

Please take time out to see this amazing piece of art ...  

  

go to the link below -  Please   

  

< http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=vOhf3OvRXKg >  

  

"J. B."