STORIES THROUGH SAND
This young woman from the Ukraine, Kseniya Simonova, won the Ukrainian version of "Britain's Got Talent" TV show - rather more serious than the acts which appear on "Britain's Got Talent". In fact, the artist has appeared to have discovered a new art form.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=518XP8prwZo
Here are some comments on the performance from YouTube viewers, giving some background information :
From what I have gathered, it is a generic story - a couple sitting on a peaceful park bench, the war starts, the song in the background tells of a woman waiting for her husband at home with a baby in a crib holding a candle, more bombs fall, she gets the envelope letting her know her husband has died, she visits the graveyard, then looks out the window with her son and sees her husband's ghost before writing "you are always near".
It's about the Nazi invasion of Ukraine, and a love story of a young couple. At the end she writes "I am waiting for you", to the Ukrainian/soviet sailor. That's why people in the audience cry, Ukraine/Russia suffered such horrendous loss of life during WWII. It's one of the most original things I've ever seen, and she's brilliant.
FYI, this appears to depict a young couple who hear news of Germany's attack on Russia. Men leave to fight & then bombings are followed by a "pokhoronka" (death notice). The young woman is aged by this & fades to a war monument. At the end the woman looks outside at a sailor with her son also dressed as a sailor (a popular boy's costume then). Maybe the
death notice was wrong & the father has returned or maybe the sailor is just a memory. The last sentence says " You are always in our hearts."
The radio broadcast in the beginning says to all the Germans have invaded the Soviet Union. The first song, Temnaya Noch, talks about a soldier on the battlefield where the bullets are flying, but his wife is home by their child's crib waiting with a candle and crying. The second song is called The Cranes - that soldiers who die in unknown places turn into white cranes.
"Moscow said the attention of citizens and citizen of the Soviet Union today, June 22, 4 o'clock in the morning, German troops attacked our country attacked our borders bombed city " and the song "The dark night, only bullets hiss on the steppe, Only the wind in the wires abuzz, star flickers dimly. In the dark night are you, beloved, I know, no sleep,
Both the child's bed by stealth tear you wipe."
The widow morphs into an obelisk for an unknown soldier, according to the Guardian blog: Ukrainian sand artist proves that reality TV's got talent. She writes: "You are always by my side. 1945"