‘The misery of one individual speaking for many’
Chester artist offers painting in lottery for Ukraine relief
More than 20 years ago, Chester artist Malcolm Callaway was profoundly affected by a black and white image included in an article by a Canadian publication about the aftermath of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.
“A photograph of this young girl who was living in the orphanage for survivors really touched me. Her look of despair, her misshapen head, the misery of one individual speaking for many,” Callaway remembered.
“It was just the tragedy of it. And it being Chernobyl that caused it. It all came apart because all of the parents of these kids had died and they left their kids in orphanages. And it just broke my heart,” he said.
The image haunted Callaway enough that he painted his interpretation of it a year later. The painting was sold. Callaway revisited the photograph in 2017, creating another oil on canvas painting of the little girl with the image of the Chernobyl plant as the backdrop, plus a few additions.
“I re did it so Chernobyl was in the background all gloomy and rotten. She sat there with her doll in her lap. And then I added these butterflies for hope,” Callaway said.
“I nailed her eyes. Her eyes are looking right back at me. It's a sadness, like there is nothing there,” Callaway said while looking at the image during an interview. “All I see in this little girl's eyes is despair and not even knowing what is going to happen to her.”
Callaway included the new painting in a portfolio of his work being shown at the time
at Secord Gallery in Halifax.
Soon after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in late February, however, Callaway decided to take the painting out of a storage closet in Halifax to use it to raise funds for humanitarian relief in Ukraine.
“Given the climate in the Ukraine I thought it (was) time to raise money from the sale of it,” Callaway said.
“The painting speaks to the inhumanity of it all. It's the continuance of man's inhumanity to man,” Callaway said. “I guess that's why I thought, let's do this now. I thought it might resonate with everybody about what is going on (in Ukraine).”
Callaway has established a lottery to sell the 30x36 unframed art piece. Each minimum donation of $25 gives one chance to win the painting. Callaway said 90 per cent of all donations would be split between the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the humanitarian work to help Ukrainian refugees by the Save the Children Fund and the Red Cross.
The winner can keep the piece or donate the painting to the gallery.
“I am doing this to get money to those people who need it for rescuing the families and the children who are getting out of there. They are all traumatized and need help,” Callaway said about the reason for the lottery.
“The whole thing is to get them out of there to anywhere but there. That's the only way they are going to stay alive, isn't it?” he said.
The painting is currently on display at Secord Gallery. It will eventually be moved to Callaway's home gallery in Chester before being displayed at the Saltbox Brewing Company in Mahone Bay.
“It's symbolic of human tragedy generally. Certainly, for children,” gallery owner and director Phil Secord said of the painting.
“This is a painting, by the way as I said to Malcolm the other day, I would hang in my own home because I don't mind being reminded of the fact that, although there is a lot of beauty in the world, there is also a lot of difficulty,” Secord said.
“We all feel and our customers feel very badly for what's going on over in the Ukraine right now. We all feel motivated to help whatever way we can,” Patrick Jardine of Saltbox Brewing Company said.
“It's something we talk about often in the brewery and with our customers. So, when the opportunity came up to support the movement, we felt we should get on board,” Jardine said.
To enter the lottery, Etransfer your money to Malcolm.callaway@gmail.com. Use the security question What's this for? The answer is Ukraine.
The winner will be chosen from a hat later in the spring. Callaway is hoping to raise between $5,000 and $7,000.
More information is available by emailing Malcolm.callaway@gmail.com or calling 902-275-5005.