Ukraine

UKRAINE

INFORMATION SHEET

Official language:

- Ukrainian;

Capital:

- Kiev;

Largest city:

- Kiev, Kharkov, Odessa;

Political system:

- Presidential-parliamentary republic;

President:

- Petro Poroshenko;

Area:

- 603 700 km²;

Population:

- 45.6 million. people;

Administrative division:

- It shares borders with Russia, Belarus, Poland, Slovakia and Hungary, Romania and Moldova;

Location:

-

Climate:

- Temperate continental, on the southern coast of Crimea - subtropical, Mediterranean type. In Transcarpathia the climate is mild, with warm winters with little snow and rainy in summer;

Time Zone:

- GMT+2;

Religion:

- Most believers Ukraine consider themselves Orthodox;

Currency:

- Hryvnia

KIEV IS THE CAPITAL OF UKRAINE

INTERESTING FACTS

Ukraine largest state in Europe

Ukraine is among the top 10 steel producers

Ranked 4th in the world in the number of IT professionals

Ukrainian "Pivdenmash" (Dnepropetrovsk) produces the most environmentally friendly delivery vehicles in the world. They help to send commercial cargo space in the international project "Sea Launch".
The author of the world's first constitution was Ukrainian statesman Philip Orlik. April 5, 1710, the first day of his Hetman, Orlik declared "Covenant and Constitution of Rights and Freedoms Cossack Army."
4 of 10 international transport corridors passing through Ukraine.

Ukraine possesses 30% of the world's richest black soil that gives the country priority in the production of agricultural products, such as:

1st place in the world in terms of sunflower oil export

3d place in the world in terms of barley export

4th place in the world in terms of grain export

3d place in the world in terms of corn export

Arsenalna Metro station,

which is located in Kyiv, is the deepest in the world; it goes into the ground at 105 meters.

An – 225 «Mriya»

made in Ukraine is the biggest plane in the world, was developed by Antonov Design Bureau.

The port of Odessa

is one of the largest ports of Black and Azov seas basin, located in the northwestern part of Black Sea. Port handles to overload more than 21 mln.

Tons of dry cargo and 25 mln.tons of liquid bulk cargo per year. Container terminals are designed for overloading more than 900 000 TEU per year. Passenger Complex is able to serve up to 4 million tourists per year.

Airport «Boryspil»

is the largest and most powerful in Ukraine. It provides about 65% of aviation passenger transportation of Ukraine and serves over 8 mln. Passengers annually.

Status of “Laura” has just 6 monasteries in the world.

Three of them are located in Ukraine. These are Holy Dormition Kyiv Pechersk Lavra which got this status in 1598, Holy Dormition Pochayiv Lavra, Svyatogorsk Holy Dormition Lavra in Donetsk region.

Culture

Taras Shevchenko in his work had reflected very thoughts and sentiments that played an important role in the life of Ukrainians at that time. His oeuvre has found an echo in the hearts of many people, as far as, in the latter part of the XIX century and in the beginning of the XX century, his book “Kobzar” was, perhaps, the only book for the most part of rural houses in Ukraine. His poems learned by heart and used Kobzar to learn to read. Icon of the poetry of Taras Shevchenko is “Dumy moi”. Taras Shevchenko hold a special place in the historical development of Ukraine, because of his literature, art and culture. Because of his origin, status and popularity, he played also peculiar role in the world literature. 24 years of 47 of life Taras Shevchenko spent in slavery, 10 years lived in exile, rest part of his life he lived under surveillance of gendarmes.

FICTION

First literary works on the territory of Ukraine fall at the period of Kiev Rus and were written in Old Slavonic language. In particular, among the first are “Povist Mynulukh Lit” (Primary Chronicle) and heroic poem “Slovo o polky Ihorevim” (The Tale of Igor's Campaign). Earliest books written in Ruthenian dates from XVI century. Therefore, in the XVI century was written “Leksys s tolkovaniiem slovenskykh slov prosto” (Ukrainian lexicography), which contains interpretation of words in Ruthenian language. Prominent masterpiece of Ruthenian language is “Peresopnytske Yevanheliie” (Peresopnytsia Gospels), which was written in 1556-1561. During XV-XVIII century literature was composed in Latin. Publication of the Ivan Kotliarevskyi’s poem “Eneyida”, which was written in vigorous style, had become the turning period in the history of Ukraine, as far as, it was the beginning of the development of modern Ukrainian language that later continued to flourish thanks to such masters of the pen as Taras Shevchenko, Lesya Ukrainka, Ivan Franko and others.

VISUAL ARTS

Christ Pantocrator – fresco of Viktor Vasnietsov in St Volodymyr's Cathedral, Kyiv;

Yehorov, NT-Art Gallery, Odessa

The development of the visual arts dates from ancient time. Archaeological finds, therefore, of the period of Trypillian and Scythian cultures are differs in original technique of the ability of the hand and testify the high artistic level of creations of ancestors of contemporary Ukrainians. Pieces of art of Rus’, which were bound with Christian church, are still in existence. Leading genres of visual arts of Rus’ were mosaic, fresco, icing painting and book-miniature. Icing painting had been the leading genre of painting until the XVII-XVIII century. Secular genres, therefore, portraiture, later landscape and pictorial art in the tideway of classicism began to develop in Ukraine beginning from XVIII century. In the middle of XIX century realism has shifted classicism. The beginning of XX century is characterized with a great deal of different artistic movements, therefore, with primitivism, and with the beginning of 1930, Soviet art began to develop in the line with socialist realism, which was proclaimed the only allowed artistic method. In the 60-70th Ukrainian Art began to split up into official art and underground art, which was free from political bias. New phase of artistic expression in Kyiv began with the arising of Underground art in 1987. Association of artists has arranged the exhibition of young generation, and in the beginning of 2000, with the end of Orange Revolution, was established the group of new generation R.E.S. (Revolutionary Experimental Space).

Mark the Evangelist. Miniature from the Peresopnytsia Gospels

Easter, Mykola Pymonenko.

MUSIC

Ukrainian cultural asset is national as well as professional music. Ukrainian folk music is varied in genres and consists of ritual and ceremonial and calendar songs, bond and barrack songs, historical songs, accompanied by Kobza and pandura and also a powerful layer of instrumental music that includes ensemble music making (“Troisti music”) and use different wind-instruments (Fistula), stringed instruments (violin) and pulsatile instruments (tembrel), as well as shepherd’s lix (especially original instruments of Western Ukraine – jaw harp and trembita ). Nowadays, folk music keeps the initial terms of existing just in the western regions of Ukraine, but folk songs have become the heritage of professional and amateur teams throughout Ukraine and it sounds in the authentic form (ensembles “Drevo”, “Volodar”, “Bozhychi”, “Buttya”), as treatments (People’s Choir named after Verovky, Maiboroda Chapel of bandura-players), are the parts of academic (Stankovych E.) and various genres of popular music (BB, Okean Elzy, Tartak, Ruslana).

THEATRE

Ukrainian performing arts falls at the beginning of ancient time. Well-known drama performances of skomorokhs with elements of theatre were part of benefit of clergy in the era of Rus’. And frescoes in the walls of St. Sophia Cathedral confirm it. Original samples of drama were proclaimed by the pupils of Kyiv Brats’ka school (Kyiv Mohyla Academy) and Lavrs’ka school (XVI–XVII centuries). The first permanent theater was opened in 1975 in Lviv in the former cathedral of Jesuits. The establishment of modern Ukrainian dramaturgy coincides with the beginning of XIX century and is bound with the names of Kotliarevskyi and Kvitka-Osnovianenko. At that time permanent theaters were established in Kyiv (1806), Odess (1809), Poltava (1810) and other cities. Starytskyi M., Kropyvnytskyi M. and Ivan Karpenko-Karyi had made a significant contribution into the development of theater in the second half of XIX century. New period in the history of national theater began in 1918, when was established the State drama theatre and “Molodyy teatr” (beginning from 1922 – modern Ukrainian theater “Berezil', named after Les’ Kurbas and Hnat Yura. But with the beginning of period of social realism innovative findings of Ukrainian artists were suppressed, and a number of activists (among of which were Les’ Kurbas and Hnat Yura) were executed.