Artist Marharyta Polovinko could have spent her life creating art that challenged, provoked, and illuminated viewers. But Russia invaded her country, so she joined the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
A rising star in Ukraine's contemporary art scene, Polovinko made the decision to enlist in late 2024, channeling the same passion that drove her art into the defense of her country.
The war shaped not only how she lived, but how she created art — many of her wartime-related pieces were made with her own blood.
On April 5, at just 31, Polovinko was killed in the Kharkiv direction of the front. She is mourned by those who fought beside her in the 2nd Mechanized Battalion of the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade and by those who knew her as an artist whose creative voice was just coming into its own.
"Marharyta was an extremely important artist for our time. She is already part of art history. The way she felt this world — its beauty and its pain at once — may be difficult to ever fully convey. But I'll try, again and again," friend and fellow artist Dasha Chechushkova told the Kyiv Independent.
"Her work speaks volumes. Her language was exquisitely concise. She was a great artist. But it must also be remembered that she died a soldier."
New artistic generation of Ukraine
Prior to the full-scale war, Polovinko's art was rooted in exploring the lives of those who are marginalized or exist on the fringes of society. As with many Ukrainian artists, the war heavily influenced how she approached her work.
"It was at the beginning of the full-scale war that she truly found her voice as an artist," friend and fellow artist Nikita Kadan told the Kyiv Independent.
"And paradoxically, just as Marharyta's art reached maturity, her choices to volunteer and serve began to leave less and less room for artistic practice."
For Polovinko, making art during wartime became a way to process what was previously unthinkable — if she "couldn't take" the latest news, then she drew it, as she said in an interview to Ukrainian media outlook Artslooker in 2023.
In an untitled 2022 sketch shared on her Instagram in early April 2022, Polovinko portrays the corpse of a Russian soldier with elongated arms and a contorted body. The corpse's open jacket reveals his internal organs, which two puppies are eating, while a mother dog watches on.
The sketch illustrates how, despite the devastation inflicted upon Ukraine by Russian forces, they are ultimately no match for the enduring power of nature. In time, nature reclaims, heals, and finds a way to keep going even in the wake of destruction.
"Drawing is (a) primitive (act), not in the sense that it is simple, but in the sense that it happens intuitively, 'by impulse.' It became a lifeline for me," Polovinko explained to Artslooker.
Polovinko also used her own blood to create a number of her artworks. In one untitled piece shared on her Instagram in late March 2024, a man points a gun at a skeleton, both seated beneath a barren tree.
"I would like to give people the opportunity to erase the blood from these works so that only a stain that cannot be washed out remains."
Their surroundings beyond the barren tree are barely discernible, compelling the viewer to focus on the contrast between the two figures. It is a raw, visceral depiction of Ukraine's struggle for survival — a literal battle waged between life and death.
By using her own blood, Polovinko transformed herself into a conduit of Ukrainians' collective pain in the war, infusing her art with a raw, bodily truth that echoes the suffering of the Ukrainian people.
"I would like to give people the opportunity to erase the blood from these works so that only a stain that cannot be washed out remains," Polovinko told the Czech media outlet Secondary Archive in 2024.
"When I start to paint, the blood is bright red. Just like the memory of trauma. Then the work fades, becomes brown or even green. The memory of the trauma also remains, but its saturation, its color changes. If something bad happens, we immediately want to cancel it. But over time, it becomes our experience, and we want to keep that."
'She had to act'
Polovinko's path to joining the Armed Forces of Ukraine began through her volunteer work.
Following the start of the full-scale war, Polovinko, like countless other Ukrainians, supported the military through fundraising efforts. She also took part in volunteer efforts like rescuing animals in Kherson Oblast and helping to rebuild homes devastated by shelling in both Mykolaiv and Kherson oblasts.
As the war dragged on, her commitment to aiding the war effort deepened. For a year and a half, she volunteered as a combat medic to evacuate the wounded from the front line. In the autumn of 2024, she became a drone operator in the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade.
Though her family and friends worried about her, they understood how much enlisting meant to her — and above all, they wanted to support her choice.
"We always knew this was going to be the next step — she mentioned thinking about enlisting for a while, so we were well prepared when it happened," her sister Anhelina told the Kyiv Independent.
"Despite the worry, I understood that it was her choice — and that, in her case, it couldn't have been any other way. My reaction was only to support her," Chechushkova added.
"Marharyta truly was a warrior — for life, for freedom. The strength, calm, decisiveness, and courage she radiated — that is and was the real beauty of life."
Polovinko's loved ones said that she was consumed by an overwhelming need to act, to push back against the injustice of Russia's war unfolding around her.
As fellow artist Katya Buchatska recalled in a post on Instagram, Polovinko "worried that all the (country's) best people would die and Ukraine would once again fall into a cyclical decline."
Polovinko was, after all, part of a generation that had come of age under the long shadow of Russia's war, which began in 2014 with the illegal annexation of Crimea and the invasion of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.
Polovinko was killed on April 5 in the Kharkiv direction and laid to rest in her hometown of Kryvyi Rih on April 11. Those who knew her will remember not only her artistic talent but also her deep compassion and unwavering dedication to helping others.
"She had to act, to stand against the terror. Because Marharyta truly was a warrior — for life, for freedom. The strength, calm, decisiveness, and courage she radiated — that is and was the real beauty of life," Chechushkova said.
"And it remains an inspiration, even now, in these dark April days, without her."
The 2nd Mechanized Battalion of the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade, where she served, also hailed her as a "true warrior," writing in a eulogy published online on April 9 that she died "with honor and weapon in hand."
Kate Tsurkan
