More than 300 children from Sumy attended the opening of the exhibition «Peace and war through the eyes of Donbas children»

15:01 / 03 Dec. 2015 / 1204

On December 3, 2015  it was opened an exhibition of children’s drawings «Peace and war through the eyes of Donbas children» in Sumy regional center of extramural study and work with talented youth. It is the fourth regional exhibition, which is organized by community initiative “Restoring Donbas” this autumn (previous exhibition were carried out in Kiev, Zhitomir and Chernivtsi).

«We keep on showing the dreams and feeling of Donbas children to other regions of Ukraine through the exhibitions. After hospitable Sumy, exhibition will go to Kharkiv. Then we plan to conduct it in three more regions of Ukraine, including Donetsk and Luhansk regions. We sincerely believe that Donbas children will be heard. We hope that their dreams will come true», – Alena Tereshchenko (volunteer of the initiative) said during the opening ceremony.

She added that the Sumy warmly welcomed more than 500 children with their parents, who came from Donbas. Nowadays, they feel comfortable in new classrooms and schools.

Children from Sumy were able not only to see the pictures of their peers from Donetsk and Luhansk regions, but also to watch a few videos, where Donbas children told about their feelings during the hostilities and appealed to children from other regions of Ukraine.

In addition, pupils of Sumy regional center of extramural study and work with talented youth, who were first, who visited the exhibition, obtained a collection of children’s drawings from Donbas with their letters, comments of psychologists and members of social networks. At the end of the opening ceremony, children had an opportunity to see the works of the participants and the winners of the contest, to watch the films, which help to learn more about Donbas before the war and destructions during the hostilities.

More than 300 pupils from Sumy attended the exhibition during just one day! Each child could make his own responding video for Donbas children. Nearly 12 thousand children (almost all the pupils of the city) will visit the exhibition. Representatives of the Center have already prepared a visitation schedule.

All children and parents should see these pictures. They have to support those children, who have stayed in Donbas “, – Larisa Tikhenko (the head of the Center) said. She also offered to conduct All-Ukrainian competition “From children of Ukraine to Donbas children ” and claimed about the willingness of Sumy to launch such project.

According to the volunteers, the main aim of such events – is to introduce Donbas children to children from other regions of Ukraine, to build a dialogue between them. Their communication is the key to the unity and a source of inner strength for overcoming the difficulties of Donbas and Ukraine.

Let us remind that children’s drawing contest “Peace and war through the eyes of Donbas children” was announced on May 9, 2015.  By August 25 – the last day of the submitting the drawings –community initiative «Restoring Donbas» has received more than 300 works from children, who are living in Donbas, and from children-IDPs. The winners were determined in 3 age groups: 5-8 years, 9-12 years, 13-16 years, and “People’s Choice Award.”

The restoring-donbass.com website - is an interactive platform, which was created by the "Restoring Donbas" community initiative of Oleksandr Klymenko. The latest news, blogs and analysis, background information and useful ads for IDPs and Donbas residents are available on the website.