Face to face with those who dared to speak out

Occasionally, in visual art, as in other areas of life, you hear stories that are so painful that it’s almost impossible to listen. Yet such stories need to be told. Our common humanity, and all that is decent and just in our species, requires this. The story of the Belarusian artist Xisha Angelova, her family and, ultimately, her country is one such example.

During the Great Terror, which began in 1936, Angelova’s maternal grandfather, the economist Nikanor Kazimirovich Yaroshevich, was imprisoned and executed in Karlag, Kazakhstan. Angelova’s grandmother Vera Shimanskaya, as a surgeon, was spared death because of her “usefulness”. Their story is a microcosm of the systemic brutality faced by countless families under Stalin’s regime. Angelova said she had chosen to paint more than 1,000 portraits of political prisoners, following the crackdown in 2020 by Alexander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus, “Because I wanted to break the chain of pain and silence that has defined my family and country for almost 100 years.”

Angelova had trained in the Russian iconographic tradition but rejected this in favour of the more familial, and familiar, Belarusian tradition. “I learnt what and how I did not want to paint,” she said. Yet this method surely underpins her collection of more than 1,000 images of friends, colleagues and countrymen — of which 200 can be seen at this exhibition — incarcerated for crimes such as writing poetry and vocalising dissent.

Angelova paints swiftly and empathetically on found material such as wrapping and wallpaper; for those who have already lost their lives, she paints on a plain white background, marked with a few sombre black crosses. Her subjects are of all ages and backgrounds.

The engineer and activist Ihar Alinevich’s ghostly pallor contrasts with an almost jolly, floral background motif. The journalist Katsiaryna Andreyeva smiles wistfully, embedded in green and silver decorative patterning. The contrast between the domesticity suggested by the paper and the implied grey, 24/7 daylight of the prison, shocks us out of complacency.

Discussing these portraits, Svietlana Tikhanovskaya, the exiled Belarusian opposition leader, said: “Art is above borders. Art doesn’t need translation. Art is more powerful than bullets. In 2020 art became the voice of our protest… Xisha started out painting angels and saints, but she continues to paint them, our modern angels and saints.” 

As with other mass brutalities and injustices we ask: what can I do? There are no easy answers. But this artwork, as moving as it is monumental, and so much more than a sum of its parts, helps. Thanks to the artist’s vision and dedication, we can bear witness to such abuses. By standing in solidarity with these people, who might in other circumstances be our friends and neighbours, we can collectively offer support. It’s the right thing to do; it’s the only thing to do.

     To January 31. The exhibition will be officially launched at an event hosted by The Times columnist Magnus Linklater, with a discussion panel that includes Xisha Angelova, tomorrow at 6.00pm at St John’s Church in Edinburgh.