The road to the temple of Peter Yemets

They say if one wants to better understand a person, he should first find out everything about his parents. It is unlikely that this will work in the case of Petr Yemets since he never saw his father and does not remember his mother at all.

My father was killed in the war before my birth. From my childhood, I remember myself reading his letters from the front. Together with the letters, there was the death notice but we knew nothing about where our father was buried. Only in 1971, we got the news that my father, Zahar Yemets, was one of the five hundred soldiers who lay in a mass grave near Goverla.

And my mother... Those were the first post-war years, when women on the collective farm worked for themselves, for the men killed at the front, and for the horses, instead of which they sowed and plowed. I was very young, so I don’t remember, but when I grew up, I was told that they had brought her paralyzed: the first snow had already fallen, and the women were forced to go into the field to gather the beets. She froze one time, then the second... While she was in the hospital in Tarascha, my older brothers went to visit her from Vovnyanka; then my mother was taken somewhere further, so they couldn’t reach her by feet.

Petr’s early childhood fell on the period of mass famine in Ukraine in 1946-1947, caused by both a crop failure and the decision of the Stalin’s Politburo to take away the remains of grain from the peasants in order to sell it or give it to the countries of the socialist camp.

Peter's early childhood fell on the period of mass starvation in Ukraine in 1946-1947.

I probably would have died of hunger without my older brothers, Andrey and Dmitry. I remember asking them to grill red beets in the oven. I took that beetroot, and it smelled so good and was so sweet. The brothers say ‘Petya, you’ve already eaten today...’. But at that time, I didn’t understand they also were hungry. Only many years later I realized this great brotherly love...

Guelder Rose Made of Red Brick

Petr Yemets became an artist because he was meant to be. He always drew, from his earliest childhood, as long as he remembers.

A long time ago, in rural houses, the earthen floor was equaled by liquid clay. I was in the third grade when I suggested to my neighbor, granny Khareta, to paint her floor. To get a beautiful tobacco color, I dissolved half-dry dung. In order to achieve a more light green shade, I added white clay. I painted the contours with a piece of coal... When the neighbors saw the result of my work, they also wanted painted floors. I worked on the “orders” of almost the whole village.

The drafts were first made on paper, and then I transferred the motif to the brown clay floor. It was something like a Petrikovskaya paining – the flowers, leaves. And when I grated the brick and got a red paint, I painted such a wonderful guilder rose...

All my “colors” were kept by granny Khareta in the cellar. And what about the real, oil ones, I first saw them when a drawing teacher Petr Starunsky came to our village. He was a graduate artist, with both the body and fate crippled by the war. He gave me a box of German colors. He explained how to use them. Since then I didn’t know how to prime the canvas, I painted on a thick cardboard.

A typical Ukrainian hut in those years - under a straw, with small windows and a large garden in the courtyard.

Tallinn

According to the state program of orphans support, after the end of the rural school, Petr Yemets got to Estonia.

In Tallinn High School of Mechanics, young men studied for the marine specialties; Petr became an underwater cartographer. In addition, in the VSAAAF aviation club (the Voluntary Society for the Assistance of the Army, Aviation, and Fleet, established in 1957) he finished the flight courses and was able to fly lightweight sports aircraft.

The Baltic has become a landmark for Petr Yemets for one more reason. It was here that he graduated from painting and graphics courses and created his first full-fledged painting with oil paints.

It was an image of a monument to women waiting for their men coming back from the sea. A bronze angel stands on a granite pedestal, raising his wings to the sky.

Guided by the “special signs” given by Petr Zaharovich, we managed to find this winged angel. It was a monument to the ‘Mermaid’ battleship, installed in the Tallinn park and dedicated to 177 sailors who died on this ship on September 7, 1893.

Seeing the picture, the teacher of fine arts said ‘Well, you are interested in adult things’. Subsequently, the school housed my first exhibition of landscape works. I still remember sketching Tallinn’s sharpened chapels. It seemed that their roofs of red shingles were lost somewhere in the clouds...

Back at Home

If he stayed in the Baltic States, he would probably become a sailor. And maybe an artist... But Petr returned home. He got a job as a teacher in the Tarascha School of Mechanization, but he did not work even for a week. The director of the Volodarsk Amenity Complex heard about the artist.

She came to Tarascha to look at my work and said to the vocational school principal ‘You have such a specialist and don’t say a word! But why do you need him?!’ Leaving, she ordered ‘He must be in my office tomorrow’.

When I went to her the next day, she said it suddenly and bluntly ‘I give you a half-time engraver and a full-time artist.’

I was amazed ‘Is it possible?’

‘Everything is possible,’ she answered shortly.

Subsequently, a branch of the Kiev Fine Arts and Design Complex was opened in Volodarsk, and Petr Zaharovich had been heading it for more than ten years. Performing his professional duties, Yemets designed city streets and developed visual agitation for the propaganda of communist ideas and the Soviet way of life. And for the good of his soul, he painted pictures. At the same time, the theme of war was dominant in his work. Here the rural boy is fishing, sitting on the wing of aircraft with a Nazi swastika, which was damaged during the war. On another canvas, there is a girl in a bathing wreath dreamed of something, stared into the distance. But this romantic mood will last only a moment because next to her on the grass, we can see her submachine gun, and this girl wears not a light summer dress, but a military tunic.

Despite such a sad topic as war, Petr Yemets in his every painting chanted a life, its bright, juicy colors. By the way, he never used black color; it just did not stick to the artist’s brush.

Also, Petr Zaharovich often painted Volodarka that became native to him. He found interesting moments at any time of the year: when the village was drowned in the splendid riot of May greenery or when houses were worn with fluffy snow caps or gardens were flaunted in lavish gold that was about to fall to the ground. But most of all he liked to draw flowers: cornflowers, poppies, mallow, peonies, chamomiles, which covered the courtyard as a thick carpet.

In 1977, the first personal exhibition of the artist was opened in the district center. There were about twenty exhibitions during the next ten years. In addition to Volodarka, the paintings were shown in the exhibition halls of Kiev, in other Ukrainian cities. In 1981, Petr Yemets, despite the fact that he had no higher professional education, joined the Artists’ Union of the USSR.

Having packed about a dozen of not very large works to be convenient to carry, and took a diploma of Tallinn courses, in order to have at least some document on art education.

At first, the works were evaluated in the Leningrad Academy of Arts, and in Leningrad I was given the recommendations for joining a creative union of professional artists. After that, I went to Moscow, where I also showed my works and got a certificate of a member of the Artists’ Union of the USSR.

In fact, during the Soviet period it wasn’t that easy to join the all-Union trade union, but now no one will tell how it really happened. Only the fact that Petr Yemets was a member of the Artists’ Union of the USSR remains unchallenged, as it has documental proof.

Meanwhile, in his native Volodarka, not only his paintings were admired; Yemets was a master of all trades. A yellowed clipping from the newspaper ‘Molodaya Gvardiya’ , August 1983, in which the publication about the artist was posted, is preserved. The journalist wrote ‘Petr Zaharovich ... with his own hands, with love built a mansion.’ ‘You will recognize the house at once; it’s the only one of a kind in Volodarka,’ people told me when I asked the way to the Yemets’ house.’

Fierce April of 1986

A good job, constant expensive orders, a good and spacious house... Nina Alexeyevna, his wife, and he had raised two children, Natalia and Zahar (the son was named by Petr Zaharovich in honor of his father). But a new love burst in the life of a 40-year-old artist; the love incinerated the calm and secure being, chased away from home and even from his native city.

The daughter of Petr and Katherine, little Ivanka, was born on April 11, 1986.

Valentina, the godmother of Ivanna, recalls ‘They were sheltered in Kiev by Katya’s sister, Raisa, who raised her son herself. They altogether lived in a communal apartment.’

And two weeks later, on April 26, 1986, Chornobyl exploded.

On April 27, the evacuation of the city of Pripyat was organized; in the following days, the residents of other settlements began to be evacuated from ten- and then from a thirty-kilometer zone of radioactive contamination. People were convinced that all these measures were temporary, for two or three days, they were not allowed to take personal things, toys, and pets.

During the evacuation, people were allowed to take only the most necessary things.

Meanwhile, the radioactive emissions from the explosion of the fourth block of the Chernobyl NPP rushed towards Central and Eastern Europe and partially fell out there. Foreign mass media started talking about a threat to life, and at this time in Kiev, other Ukrainian cities and villages, unknowingly people walking on radioactive dust went out to May Day demonstrations and mass festivities; instead of an honest message about the deadly danger, the perestroika authority began politico-propagandistic flirting with their own people and the international community.

Having heard about the accident at the Chernobyl NPP, Petr Zaharovich, on the weekend, took his sketchbook and went to Pripyat to sneak into the zone and see with his own eyes what had happened there. He witnessed events that remained embedded in his mind forever.

The columns of machinery were moving along the streets of the city in an endless stream, and military helicopters were buzzing in the sky. At first, I thought that the war had begun...

Realizing what happened, Petr Yemets signed up as a liquidator-volunteer of the consequences of the accident. At first, he thought to do it only during his vocation, then – during the summer, later he planned to stay for six months, but it turned out differently.

Zone

Chernobyl opened a new era in which such phrases as the emission of radiation, radiation sickness, gene mutations have become familiar. But at first, the radiation did not frighten.

You come after the watch in Kiev, everyone asks ‘Well, how’s the radiation there?’ You shrug your shoulders: who knows. If it was something like a rock flying and hitting the head then it would be clear. But you don’t feel anything. The head is aching or the voice has gone; what a big deal...

He worked as a duty officer at the checkpoint. Two days he stood on the watch, then painted for three days: for himself, for friends and acquaintances. Sometimes, for one day, he created several paintings.

A lot of works were taken by the guys... I painted something for a good memory to each of them: a portrait or a landscape, more, less, very small; everyone wanted to take home something, even a tiny one.

Only a small part of the works remained with the author. It was these paintings, created directly in the exclusion zone during 1986-1988, that entered the Chernobyl collection of Petr Yemets. They are about two hundred canvases, which absorbed the pain and grief of the ruined land.

The head of the pioneer camp ‘Skazochniy’ I.Ya. Lerner said ‘Peter is the first of the artists who voluntarily came to the zone. If only you would see how sublime children look in his paintings.’

There were Ukrainians, Russians, Uzbeks, Turkmens on his portraits ... We do not say “volunteers” because someone came to Chernobyl by order, and some by coercion. Among liquidators, you might meet business travelers, prisoners, and boys, who were drafted into the army and sent to Chernobyl. The least of all they thought of high patriotism, some merits and rewards at that time, but they became real heroes, whose heroic deed later became the talk of the whole world...

I was struck by the incredible efficiency of people, the lack of swagger and meanness among the liquidators. The zone cut off the mean man right away, from the first minute. Somehow it was immediately clear who is who.

In addition to making portraits, Petr Yemets went to the contaminated forest, to abandoned villages, to the shore of a poisoned river. Everything was amazing. Nature abounded incredibly. In one of the documentaries filmed in Chernobyl, there are shots with a mushroom, which Petr Yemets came across during one of such “walks”.

It was round, like a champignon, but so big that is impossible for the mushrooms in nature. Dazzling white, it grew up right on the road. At the end of the week, the camera crew arrived and the footage with this mushroom was included in the documentary.

They shoot incredible things. I gave them a whole heap of roses: the usual roses, but with the thorns on the petals. Lime leaf is one and a half meters long and a meter wide...

Of course, I understood that radiation does terrible things with our organisms, in the seventh generation such children will begin to be born (P. Yemets points to the picture “Mutants of the USSR” - ed.). But I was wrong; this process began much earlier. There are mutants already among us.

‘Why didn’t they leave, didn’t run away from that deadly danger?’ journalists later asked Petr Zaharovich.

Are you kidding? You may now say this, and then there was work, people were next to me; altogether we were doing one thing. How could I leave? And who would find all this, draw those abandoned houses? How can I leave everything and run away?

But the artist is cunning a little because he did run but vice versa into the zone. When one watch came to an end, he immediately asked for another. And if he was forbidden, then he lived illegally. If the administration removed food supplies, many friends helped, because there was no person in the zone who didn’t know Petr Yemets. Although he was very hot-tempered, he immediately evoked sympathy, because he did not worry about his own interest, he was cheerful and sociable, even in spite of the terrible conditions in which he had to live and work.

In the morning, familiar guys gave me a lift on UAZ (the car manufactured on Ulyanovsk Automobile Plant – transl.) or APC at distant points, and in the evening they took me back. But sometimes I wandered so far that I missed the time of returning to the agreed place, and there wasn’t even a thought of mobile phones at that time. So I stayed in the first abandoned house for the night. But I didn’t like such nights very much: there was a terrible silence all around and you were alone in a dead village.

At first, I went without any system, at random, but later I divided the zone into conditional squares and one by one surveyed every scrap.

True, they shouted at me a little, until I got to know the KGB colonel Valery Pavlovich Burenin; he helped me both with paints and with permission to paint. Actually, the authorities were satisfied: after all, they had their own artist, for every holiday, there was an exhibition. Maybe these pictures didn’t come into the world if I weren’t given such freedom. They said ‘Petr, draw everything. We will try to take it out.’

Photo: Colonel V.P. Burenin on his “personal vehicle”


The biggest difficulty was to take it out because it was not allowed to take anything from the zone: all items were contaminated with radiation. There is still footage of the film, in which Petr Yemets, commenting on one of the canvases created directly in the 30-kilometer zone, says ‘The main thing is that I already have a slide of this picture. Before it was impossible to photograph, the film was spoiled at ones.’

As if to confirm these words, there is the blackened, as if lighted photograph of the artist himself (by the way, very similar to the “Self-portrait”), on the back of Petr Zaharovich wrote ‘Radioactivity destroyed the film, 1987’.

Radioactivity destroyed the film.

Recognition

The citizens of Kiev saw a collection of paintings “Bells of Chernobyl” in late 1988 when the first personal exhibition of Petr Zaharovich was opened in the Republican House of Writers.

By that time, the Yemets family had already had their own housing in Kiev, if one could call an eleven-meter room with a tiny kitchen in a hostel on Marshal Rokossovsky Street the housing. Pictures were everywhere. Both pictures from the 30-kilometer zone and the fresh ones, not yet dried from the paint. They stood and lay everywhere, in the room, in the kitchen, on the balcony. A little time will pass, and these canvases will surprise the whole world, but first, they should have been seen by Ukraine.

In the following 1989 year, the eight vernissages of Petr Yemets were held. The period of glory began. The talented artist was called the chronicler of the era, a brilliant author of historical and documentary paintings. The city’s creative circles recognized him as one of them. Many doors were opened before the artist. At the end of the same 1989, Petr Yemets was admitted to the Artists’ Union of the USSR.

Petr Yemets’ exhibition is blessed by Philaret, Metropolitan of Kiev and all over Ukraine

Art museums wanted to have his paintings. In particular, in October 1990, the State History Museum of the Ukrainian SSR showed interest in acquiring works by Petr Zaharovich. ‘The works you have done on the Chernobyl subject are of particular value for us. The museum also intends to purchase a number of works from those paintings that are currently at an exhibition abroad (Sweden, Holland),’ wrote the director of the museum, I.V. Kardash in an official letter to the artist. (B)

Finally, the housing problem was resolved; Petr Zaharovich and his family moved to a spacious three-room apartment on Obolon. But the rebellious nature of Yemets could not be reassured by titles, living quarters, or earnings. He did not pay attention to the universally recognized authorities. If he didn’t like something he spoke about it openly. Not everyone liked it, so many of his colleagues were not good to him.

In 2002, Vladimir Pidgora wrote ‘Petr Yemets was awarded the Gold Medal of the Good Foundation, the Gold Diploma of the Leonardo da Vinci School of Art (Italy), a commemorative diploma of charity... But for some reason, no government award is mentioned on this list. It’s because there are no such awards. But why? Is the chronicler and participant of the liquidation of the Chernobyl accident consequences not respected by the power of independent Ukraine? It’s surprisingly. It’s unclear.’

In fact, this question was rhetorical, because the author of those lines and other people close to the artist knew the reason. The press of that time openly stated ‘Today there are about fifty masters in the Artists’ Union of Ukraine who created their works on the Chernobyl theme “from nature”. But it is precisely known that in 1986-1987 Yemets was the only professional artist working in the Exclusion Zone of the ChNPP... Yemets’ works almost never coincide with the pictures of his colleagues at thematic exhibitions. They say that the pseudo-Chernobyls are trying in every possible way to obscure the significance of Yemets’ creativity in order to get more laurels...’

Peter Eemets and Vladimir Pidgora in the 30-kilometer zone of alienation

Confirmation of this is found in a documentary, filmed by journalists of the National Television Company of Ukraine on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster.

‘Have you seen a lot of people with easels and brushes there (in the 30-kilometer exclusion zone - ed.)? Because I’ve already counted at least a hundred artists who received some awards, medals, top presidential awards for telling the truth about Chernobyl.’ Petr Yemets was asked by the host of the program, Alexander Anisimov.

Petr Zaharovich thought for a moment.

‘You know, there was one... Valery Bobkov. He’s the professional artist, a member of the Artists’ Union of the USSR. But he stayed for three months and went home. He made a few sketches, in fact.’

‘And where did the dozens of others come from?’ The journalist asked.

‘Yes, numbers... But what can I do...’

Journalist Alexander Anisimov during the filming of a documentary television film about Peter Yemts

However, misunderstandings with colleagues were not the only problem of Petr Yemets. The scammers repeatedly tried to deceive the artist. In fact, the “Bells of Chernobyl” have seen many adventures in their life, but each time they returned to the rightful owner. In particular, on April 18, 1991, the newspaper Sovetskaya Zhytomyrshchina (d) wrote ‘Almost a whole year, a hundred paintings by P. Z. Yemets “traveled” through Sweden. The smart dealers from the cooperative “Zodchiye”, that was closed a year ago for serious violations of legislation and abuse philanthropists, gave themselves out philanthropists. The bedridden artist did not know this when agreed to their proposal. In fact, insidious commerce was created behind his back. The exhibition was being prepared to be transported to Denmark. It is difficult to convey in words what the artist experienced, accidentally learning the whole truth. No fee was ever sent from the profits by his “patrons”. Only after hearing that the scam was eventually solved, they decided to cover up some tracks. Only then did the pictures “come” to Ukrainian customs.’

During this period, Petr Zaharovich was on inpatient treatment at the Kiev Radiological Center. The doctors found out that he had an initial stage of leukemia.

America

It is not known how the treatment would have ended without a happy coincidence. Literally, a week after the publication of the above-mentioned newspaper article, on April 25, 1991, the UN Under-Secretary-General, Margaret Joan Anstee, arrived in Kiev. She visited the “Bells of Chernobyl” exhibition and highly appreciated the canvases of the artist presented on it.

The Ukrainian press quoted the words of Margaret J. Anstee ‘An impression of me and my colleagues was made by an exhibition of paintings by Petr Yemets, who had been creating his works for three years in a 30-kilometer zone; they became a real document of the era. I told the author, that I was delighted with his talent.’

Shortly thereafter, along with the UN line, Petr Zaharovich was invited to America for a course of treatment. But he did not go empty-handed to the US. The invitation clearly stated: it is very desirable to take pictures with you.

The canvas of Petr Zaharovich surprised and shocked Americans by both the very truth of life and the talent which conveyed this truth.

New York. 1991 year.

Turning Point

The doctors gave a comforting prognosis, the disease will not return. The Americans invited him to stay and work for several years, and Petr Zaharovich accepted this offer. At the end of February 1992, he returned to Ukraine to take his wife and daughter with him to America (for this, it was necessary to finally get married to Katherine and formalize the paternity for Ivanna). But two weeks later the event, from which he never recovered completely, happened.

Perhaps this was again the fault of his fiery temper. The couple went to visit relatives and got quarreled there. It was an ordinary family squabble, but Katya took everything to heart and got ready to go home. Her nephew Sasha went with her, and the annoyed man stayed to spend the night on a visit. When he returned home in the morning, he saw on his desk a note from his wife ‘Petr, take care of Ivanka...’

Valentina ‘We found Katya in the hospital. I turned out she decided to commit a suicide and throw herself under the train, but she stayed alive. She died in the operating room.’

Katherine’s relatives accused Petr of everything. However, he until the end of his life blamed himself for not going after her too...

The 48-year-old artist was left alone with a five-year-old daughter to take care of, who according to documents was completely alien to him. Friends gave him different advice. Some thought that it would be better to put her in the orphanage because a man cannot cope with the upbringing of a little girl. But he did not want to listen, for more than a year he had been fighting against the child protection service until he had got a positive conclusion about the adoption.

What he felt at that time, in short, is told in the newspaper clippings. In October 1992, the artist’s friend Alexander Vinokurov wrote ‘We hadn’t seen each other for a long time, and when he called, I was sincerely glad, I kept asking questions ‘ How is your health? How is America? How are your exhibitions there?’

‘Don’t you know anything?’ Petr’s voice trembled. ‘Katya is dead...’

One more shock. The first family broke up. In the second, there’s death. Petr remained with his daughter Ivanka. Depression. But Yemets is a strong person. When I came to him, he led me to the easel ‘I was drawing it all night long’.  Smiling Katya, Petr’s wife, was looking at me...’

Europe

Was Peter Yemets a religious man? It’s more likely no than yes. However, he did not deny the spiritual principle and spirituality of all existing.

‘Well, if we could control ourselves... No, our planet and our lives are controlled by someone; we don’t know who it is. I do not claim that it’s God or some other person, but some sort of power governs everything.’

In the post-Chernobyl period, the artist increasingly reproduces temples and other objects of sacral architecture on paper. In Kiev, he paints the capital’s churches, the China Pustyn (Svyato-Troitsky Monastery in Kiev – transl.), the St. Sophia Cathedral. Traveling through the countries of Europe, he creates a series of watercolor and oil paintings from nature, in which Orthodox cathedrals, Catholic churches, and Moslem mosques are depicted with great love.

The particularly indelible impression was made on Petr Yemets by Italy and acquaintance with Giorgio Bondgiovanni.

Ukrainian newspapers wrote ‘In the city of Mascalucia on the island of Sicily, for several months (from October to the end of 1993) his exhibition “Bells of Chernobyl” had been displaying. The exhibition of the Ukrainian artist was organized by the activists of the Italian society “Arka”, engaged in environmental, religious and UFOlogical problems. Above all Eugenio Siragusa, Giorgio Bongiovanni and Orazio Valenti, who recently visited Kiev, took part in the organization of the exhibition.

Italians warmly met Petr Yemets; he was awarded a diploma of the Leonardo da Vinci Art School, the administration of Sicily and the city of Mascalucia. When he was going to return home, the Italians staged a small concert, which began with the melody “The Cossack was riding behind the Danube”.

Petr Yemets during the UFOlogical conference in Italy

Peter Zaharovich arrived in Italy due to the invitation of a famous stigmatist who introduced the Ukrainian artist as the last prophet. And all because of the picture “The Road from the Promised Paradise”, where Petr Yemets depicted the collapse of the USSR a few years before it actually happened.

For 70 years the man worked to earn for living, feed his hungry children. To date, the Central Committee in Moscow, like a hunted wolf, doesn’t know where to rush, what weapons to use against this poor people. It makes people afraid. There will be trial foreseen many centuries ago, and the people will ask what they gave all the years away for? In honor of what? Let them shoot me, but if it becomes possible, I will ask my government: who has stolen my life? I am 47 years old today, and I only know kicks, only years of hunger and poverty. Even the opportunity to see how people live elsewhere was hidden from me. They were afraid I could compare that regimen with this one. But the curtain has fallen.

Although, despite such sharp criticism, Petr Yemets still loved Ukraine, and every time he returned home.

Don’t believe the one who tells you how good it is in a strange land; it’s not true.

Lost Expectations

He saw rich America and poor Afghanistan, blooming Italy and ruined Yugoslavia, he was welcomed by prosperous Berlin and shocked by the terrible carnage of Sarajevo. But the biggest test was waiting for him in Ukraine, where at that time the first economic reforms were carried out. Simultaneously with great expectations and an extraordinary upsurge of patriotic Ukrainians, the 1990’s entered the history of his country as a period of a catastrophic decline in the standard of living, rampant lawlessness, voucher privatization, the rapid enrichment of a small group of people close to the power and impoverishment of others.

In the working version of the documentary about Petr Zaharovich, filmed in 1996, there are shots that are not included in the film. These are they that give us an understanding of how the artist treated the new government.

Interviewer ‘Very much in Kiev is destroyed. Even those things survived the fascists and communists are disappearing now. How can this be resisted?’

Petr Yemets ‘Well, why? For example, I saw other things: new buildings are so exquisite there, in Tsarskoe Selo. Kiev is still far from that. So you think in vain... Kiev is being built, but secretly from the people.’

Was Peter Yemets a patriot? Undoubtedly, if by patriotism we mean a special emotional experience for the fate of our country. But he never flirted with power, could not draw things the political leaders liked at a particular moment, so there were periods when Petr Yemets barely made ends meet. Especially because of his Chernobyl at that time, too, was not relevant; the art market of the late 1990’s was already interested in other things. Hence, the offense and hurt appeared in the heart of the artist.

Perhaps once my daughter, who doesn’t eat what her neighbor’s children eat, won’t forgive me... But she will understand... I swore: I won’t sell and won’t give a single work. This country, which I live in, won’t get even a bad, even my worst etude. I won’t forgive it my daughter being almost starving...

But, unfortunately, he was mistaken about Ivanna. His daughter, his bright, comforting ray, did not understand and did not forgive him. And maybe someone whispered to her how her mother died and who is to blame for this? In any case, when she grew up, misunderstandings arose between her and her father. Eventually, the father and daughter exchanged a three-room apartment for two little ones and dispersed to different ends of Kiev. Subsequently, Petr Zaharovich had lost this modest housing too.

According to Olga (the third wife and the official widow of P.Z. Yemets), ‘Ivanna lived separately, and Petr was very worried about her, but she almost didn’t communicate with her father. Finally, we decided to sell an apartment in Kiev and move to Volodarka, which was often remembered by Petr Zaharovich.’

However, the family life did not go well, so the couple decided to live separately, although they did not part officially. Petr Zaharovich settled in the house, where his friends let him. He lived very modestly; however, it seemed that he was oppressed neither by the ceilings redecorated long time ago nor by the old furniture. He was completely immersed in art. He could not live even a day without painting. Pictures became his world, his sorrows, and joy.

Instead of Epilogue

Life and death, love and betrayal, wealth and poverty, persecution and confession, it was much, too much for one person. But neither illness nor life troubles broke Petr Yemets.

One of the friends said ‘We met in 2011, and through communication with Petr Zaharovich, I began to look at life in a different way, I discovered an amazing world of art...

He was older than me by almost 40 years, but I didn’t feel the difference in age. Petr Zaharovich energized us, the young, and literally radiated positive. Still, I can see the wide, happy smile of my older friend, which I saw constantly when visited him. He always waited for me, but he never bothered anyone, he didn’t impose his person. Although, I often saw some people at his place; they came to him, knowing that he wouldn’t refuse anything; he would give up everything he had: spiritual warmth, money, pictures – he did spare nothing. During his last years, Petr Yemets used to paint many flowers, and I always wondered at his bright, juicy and cheerful canvases.

Petr Zaharovich died on October 18, 2016, after suffering a stroke. But for me he is still alive; he is emotionally proving and fixing his unfinished picture of life on the easel…