On 14 May 2018, an ethnic fashion show featuring servicewomen who fought in Eastern Ukraine, as well as female volunteers and military journalists. The event was organized by the Ministry of Information Policy of Ukraine and the NGO International Vyshyvanka Day.
“This event is our tribute of honour to women who in this hard time for our country go to the front line and together with men take active part in suppressing the aggressor. [This is] our attempt to distract them from the scourge of war. Though they have been bearing the brunt of the saviours of our homeland, they are, first of all, beautiful and outstanding Ukrainian women,” the Minister of Information Policy, Yuriy Stets, noted in his speech.
During the event, 30 servicewomen and female volunteers and journalists strode onstage in embroidered dresses made by modern Ukrainian designers. The organizers also prepared an embroidered ‘red carpet’, an exhibition of 40 paintings on the topic of embroidery made by ten modern artists from all over Ukraine, large-scale canvases ‘Ukrainian Amazonians’, and 2D-mapping of Petrykivka and Samchakivka painting.
In addition, the visitors to the event could enjoy ancient traditional clothing from collections from Ukrainian regions.
“We wanted to show that the Ukrainian woman, even when she is fighting, is still beautiful. She can buttress, or take up arms as well as men,” Maryna Sobotiuk, the Adviser to the Minister of Information Policy of Ukraine on International Communication and head of the project ‘Ukrainian Amazonians’, stressed.
The event was attended by Iryna Herashchenko, First Deputy Chairwoman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine; Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, Vice Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration of Ukraine; Hugh Mingarelli, Head of the Delegation of the European Union to Ukraine; Yevhen Nyshchuk, Minister of Culture of Ukraine; Emine Dzhaparova, First Deputy Minister of Information Policy; Artem Bidenko, MIP’s State Secretary; diplomats, officials from bodies of state power, and members of the public. More than 150 media workers had been accredited to the event; members of the diaspora from Israel and the UAE had come, too.