You won’t find them in a guidebook. And, no bigger than a soccer ball, they’re not so easy to spot on the streets either.
Seven bronze sculptures featuring famous symbols of Kyiv have been installed around the center of the Ukrainian capital as part of the Shukay (meaning “seek!” in Ukrainian) project.
One of the statues in the Shukay project, a bronze carriage. (managerofkyiv.com)
Yulia Bevzenko, a blogger, tourist guide, and the initiator of the project, says she installed the sculptures to prompt Kyiv residents to walk around the city looking for them, to learn the history behind them, and then to take foreign guests on walking tours.
The sculptures are a chicken Kyiv, a Kyiv chestnut, a Kyiv cake, a Kyiv candied fruit, a Kyiv carriage, a Kyiv tram and a Kyiv brick or plinth brick — a type of brick used since ancient times in churches and other old buildings.
All of the sculptures have QR codes on their info boards, which can be scanned to get more information about the object in English and Ukrainian.
Kyiv residents and visitors are already on the hunt for the statues.
Tatyana Sakach, an HR manager with a Kyiv-based company, took her friends from Spain to look for the statues when they came to Ukraine’s capital in late May for the Champions League final match.
A statue in the Shukay project, a bronze tram. (managerofkyiv.com)
“It adds something interactive to the visit because you can talk about the object,” Sakach says.
She also attended the opening of the latest sculpture — the plinth brick — on June 8. Placed on a wall of a building in Kyiv’s Podil district, the bronze plinth brick refers to wide and flat-baked brick that was used to build the Golden Gate, or Zoloti Vorota, and St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv.
While Bevzenko is the founder and driving force behind the project, all of the sculptures were created by artists from the Gallenko Gallery, a sculpture studio. Each statue was sponsored by a Kyiv-based company related to the subject of the sculpture. For instance, the plinth brick was financed by the construction company UkrBud.
A statue in the Shukay project, bronze candies. (managerofkyiv.com)
The Kyiv cake sculpture was sponsored by confectionery giant Roshen, which is owned by Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. Kyiv cake is not only a traditional Kyiv treat, but also a trademark product of Roshen — the cake’s recipe and production method was created in 1956 at the Karl Marx Confectionary Factory, now Roshen.
On the project’s website, Bevzenko has created an accompanying “myth” for each statue. For example, those who touch the sculpture of the plinth brick will get a house.
Five more sculptures will be presented by the end of 2018, Bevzenko says, but what these are is still a secret.
