By Alyona Prytula

Ukraine and Ukrainians

2013

Telepyno school of I-III grades

These fortresses are no doubt on the first place of 7 wonders of Ukraine. Kamyanets - Podilskyy town has the frotification system that is unique all over the Europe and Hotyn fortrees was the center of numerous wars and fights.

Kamyanets-Podilskyy and Hotyn fortresses

Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra is a unique monastic complex, included by the UNESCO into the list of the monuments of the world-wide significance. The complex consists of two parts: the above-ground (religious constructions complex) and underground (caves).

Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra

Adventurous trip to Hoverla mountain will not live leave any touris indifferent as this is the highest mountain in Ukraine. An additional excursion can be made to the Prut River waterfall, one of the Danube tributaries, situated to the south of the main trail.

Hoverla mountain

Rynok Square - the centre of the Lviv historical-architectural preserve - ia a grand esembly. It is dated back to the 14th century and is formed by a complex of 44 buildings, different in style and period. Many of them beras traces of Reneissance, baroque, Empire and modern styles.

Esembly of Rynok square in Lviv

Kseniya SimonovaDate of birth: 22 April 1985 (Eupatoriya, Ukrainian SSR)

Kseniya Simonova is a sand animator from Ukraine. She started drawing with sand after her business collapsed due to the 2008 financial crisis, and had less than one year experience when she entered Ukraine's Got Talent. She became the 2009 winner of that show, making a sand animation that portrayed life during the USSR's Great Patriotic War against the Third Reich in World War II. Simonova won 1,000,000 Ukrainian Hryvnia (approx. USD125,000) for her first place in the show.

Date of birth: 12 January 1909 (in the village of Bolotnya in the Ivankiv Raion, Kiev Oblast)Maria Pryimachenko was a renowned Ukrainian village folk art painter, representative of naive art. The artist was involved with drawing, embroidery and painting оn ceramics. Іn her childhood Maria was taken ill with polio, and this painful disease influenced the girl's life. By reports of her relatives, Maria grew а thoughtful and considerate person, having compassion for nature and every living thing. The works of Pryimachenko can be subdivided into thematic, symbolic and ornamental pieces. Maria Pryimachenko has developed a style of her own.

Maria Pryimachenko

Her talent was noticed due to the communist slogan of the 1930s: any person who “delves and spins” can become a poet and an artist. Her works – pictures as well as pottery- and textile painting – were promoted by the regime and sent to international exhibitions in Paris, Warsaw. Sophia, Montreal, Prague. During her life Maria Prymachenko painted more than a thousand pictures. About half of them are now at Kyiv Museum of Decorative Art, some 200 – in other museums of Ukraine and the ex-USSR, another 200 are owned by private collectors. Maria Prymachenko was right-handed, but she painted all her pictures with her left hand. She might have instinctively felt that this world and the world of her imagination did not overlap. Maria died at the age of 89. The year 2009 was announced by UNESCO the year of Maria Prymachenko.

Date of birth: 11 October 1983 (Gorlovka, Donetska oblast, Ukrainian SSR)

Ruslan Ponomariov is a Ukrainian chessplayer and former FIDE world champion. In 1998, at the age of fourteen, he was awarded the Grandmaster title, making him the youngest ever player at that time to hold the title. In 2002 Ruslan became FIDE world champion at the age of 18, the first teenager and youngest person to ever become FIDE world champion.

Ruslan Ponomariov

Date of birth: 24 May 1973 (Lviv, Ukrainian SSR)

Ruslana is the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2004, a World Music Award winning and MTV Europe Music Award nominated artist. She is a singer, songwriter, producer, conductor, and pianist. She writes, composes and produces her own songs and music videos.

Ruslana

Date of birth: 25 June 1988 (Kovalilvka in Kolomiya, Ukrainian SSR)

Olesya Stefanko is a Ukrainian beauty pageant titleholder who was crowned Miss Ukraine Universe 2011 and represented her country in the 2011 Miss Universe pageant, where she was 1st runner up. Olesya Stefanko became Ukraine's highest placement in history. Olesya was born in Kolomyia (village Kovalivka) in the Carpathian region of Ukraine. She was named Miss Odesa National Law Academy in 2008 as a student at the Institute of Prosecution and Investigation. After her victory at Miss Ukraine Universe 2011, she began her modeling career. She's currently pursuing a law degree in Odessa.

Olesya Stefanko

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