How to make the sacred into a fairy tale?

What are your favorite cartoons? Which characters you grew up with, and was any of them Ukrainian? Most likely, the minds of an entire generation in Ukraine have been dominated from childhood by Soviet, Russian or American cartoon images. Even now, despite the excessive presence of war coverage on Ukrainian screens, even dedicated children’s TV channels “feed” foreign product to their young audience, thus spreading alien mentality, alien traditions, alien values...

Psychologists say that the child believes everything it sees, and quickly gets used to beautiful color pictures shown on the screen. It is one thing with American or European cartoons, which are often innocent in their message, but Russian cartoons, known for their propaganda distortions, are another matter. What is the state of Ukrainian animation? Where to look for an alternative? What should one show their child to help it grow into a balanced, calm person who would love Ukraine and identify themselves as Ukrainian from the first years of their life?

“We are really short of high-quality Ukrainian cartoons today,” director of the ART Video animation company Eduard Zaniuk told The Day. “Why is it so? Because the government is not interested in it, does not take the initiative and does nothing to ensure that Ukrainian channels show more Ukrainian product. This is unlike other countries where broadcasters must show domestic animated productions, create something of their own rather than just translate foreign ones. Our government does not understand that contact with mother tongue is important for kids, and it can happen through a game, a fairy tale or a good cartoon.”

Zaniuk leads the ART Video company which engages in education and popularization of spiritual values amid young children via cartoons. Their projects include many cartoons, such as The Adventures of Twisty the Cat, The Fairy Tale Patrol, Legends of Ukraine, and a revival of the Cossacks series.

However, their likely most ambitious project as of now is a cartoon series about religious values, called The Spiritual Necklace and numbering over 20 episodes already. The cartoons tell the stories of St. George’s Cathedral, St. Andrew’s Church, Church of the Transfiguration, Metropolitan Andrei Sheptytsky, and more. All feature modern style and design. The series’ protagonist is the Artist who travels around Ukraine aiming to make sketches of churches, and his magic pencil takes the audience into the past of the sacred buildings. The Artist’s companion is the Nightingale who tells interesting stories about how churches were built.

“We have used the traditional technology, showing two 3D characters telling the story,” Zaniuk said. “However, not content with just making a decent video, we wanted to develop a style of our own, and we are well on the way to it now. Actually, The Spiritual Necklace is the name of our series devoted to sacred subjects. We started to make it in Lviv, picturing various temples and holy places. First of all, we wanted to show the city through its religious monuments. Later on, we decided to extend the project to other regions, so expanding our geographical coverage.”

According to the animator, it was an interest in history that attracted the artists to things sacred. “When a person, and especially a child, walks past a shrine, a church, they unwittingly turn curious. They start asking questions: it is unbelievable, how has it managed to survive for so long?! How many events were held there over centuries, how momentous some of them were, etc. We do not try to celebrate a mass, we try to create a fairy tale about a holy place. I think that many artists will yet address this topic, using various media. Thus, we launched it with an interest in revealing our past,” Zaniuk said.

Lately, The Spiritual Necklace’s creators have decided to look for a different approach to presenting the stories, so the most recent cartoons were made without the main characters present, but they have not lost their “flavor.” “We have involved children into recording the narration and completely changed the style, making it easier and more interesting,” the animator added.

The artists decided to create a Ukrainian cartoon magazine, also named The Spiritual Necklace, and combine in it productions on sacred, historical, educational, and ethnic topics, letting children see a whole kaleidoscope of cartoons.

“We have presented our magazine in different places, starting at the capital’s Mystetsky Arsenal,” the animation company’s top manager continued. “I am very grateful to Associate Professor of Drahomanov University Oksana Polataiko and other teachers who helped us make not just cartoon presentations, but an actual art event for children, which provided them with educational experience as well as a sort of art therapy. We also talked to colleagues from outside Ukraine, for example during a teleconference with Poland. Moreover, we plan to show The Spiritual Necklace in the New World.”

According to the animator, there is a limited proposition of quality children’s cartoons on the market now, and this is especially so with history-themed, entertaining or educational productions. “As for the history of Kyiv, and wider Ukrainian history, it has a huge potential, as children have long waited for such cartoons. In the absence of cartoons of our own, foreign productions will turn our children into a new generation of hired thugs. What good will it do to our children to watch a cartoon portraying Volodymyr the Great, the baptizer of Rus’, as a narrow-minded and vile man? How likely will be the child to respect and understand its heroes, its land, and its history afterwards? We should educate children using our traditions, our heroes, our history...,” Zaniuk added.

The crisis now engulfing the country does not stop the artists’ work, and they plan to further expand and promote their portfolio. After all, they say, the children now need, more than ever, to understand and watch the quality, interesting, instructive product, which would both, educate and cheer them, as well as distract them from negative information being actively broadcast on TV.

“We were pleased to find the Kyiv City State Administration interested in our work, and they have decided to cooperate with us, to show our productions in educational institutions in full compliance with the law,” Zaniuk said. “We also want to offer a chance to watch a cartoon to children whose parents are defending Ukraine now, and plan to ask the Ministry of Internal Affairs to organize such showings, for now is the time when the Ukrainian TV product is in very high demand.”