I no longer paint.
When my children asked whether they had to choose a side – their father Russian, their stepmother Ukrainian, while they were born Swedish and I am Belarusian – I felt an urgent need to support them. I also saw how many children grow up without fathers in these turbulent times.
I realized my art could no longer simply adorn walls. It had to heal the world, tie nations together, and carry meaning close to every heart.
Ties left behind in wardrobes are not only symbols of power, masculinity, and patriarchy – they are also silent witnesses to grief, loss, and hope. From this pain, Roses of Ties was born: women fold old ties into roses to wear close to their hearts.
The project travels the world, transforming memories into solidarity and loss into hope. And I still ask myself… how many years will we need art to heal? How many roses will it take? Can women, through their hands and craft, fill the world with these noble roses? Can the gentle power of femininity, expressed in patience, care, and creation, shape a world of hope? And can craft – which gives no material reward but heals the soul – be a quiet form of feminism, changing the world one rose at a time?
Last but not least, how long must I, as a woman artist, be told by curators and art institutions that Roses of Ties is “not art”? Who gets to define art, and whose voices have historically held that power?
Today, Ludmila travels the world, teaching women to craft Roses of Ties, turning loss into beauty, memory into solidarity, and stories into symbols of resilience.
On 7 March, she will present Roses of Ties in Zagreb in Cravaticum – Boutique Museum of the Cravat. In Zagreb, L. Christeseva has invited fashion students led by Assistant Professor Ivana Mrčela and Associate Professor Lea Popinjac from the Department of Textile and Clothing Design at the University of Zagreb Faculty of Textile Technology to contribute to the exhibition. Their work reflects on femininity as an active force in peacebuilding, cultural exchange, and social renewal in a world marked by conflict and displacement.
The exhibition is timed to coincide with International Women’s Day.
