This week, a few books arrived that had been recommended by a Ukrainian postgraduate. She made a blanket recommendation for books published by Kyiv-based Osnovy Publishing, who describe their interest as being “visually engaging publications with contemporary, design-forward books on photography, art and culture” and their specialism as “art and books about architecture and cultural phenomena” (from this page).
Osnovy publish chiefly in English, and their books are incredibly popular – many of their titles were sold out. Here are four we managed to order from them:
- Orthodox chic / photographers, Alex Bykov, Oleksandr Burlaka, Sasha Kurmaz ; introductory text, Asya Bazdyreva.
- A 2020 catalogue of Orthodox churches in Ukraine, old and new, traditional and very much not. You can see more images from the book on its Osnovy webpage.
- The art of Ukrainian sixties / editors, Olha Balashova, Lizaveta German ; translator John Nikolson.
- A history and catalogue of 1960s Ukrainian art, often unofficial. Again, you can see more images from the book on its Osnovy webpage.
- Two of the Osnovy Ukraine guidebooks. These are not the kinds of things that we would normally buy for the UL, but they are lovely publications and, of course, they describe and celebrate cities that have undergone terrible Russian attacks since.
- Awesome Odesa : interesting things you need to know / authors of texts, Igor Makhtiienko, Victoria Linchevskaya. (2nd edition, 2019; MMLL have the 2017 1st edition)
- Awesome Kyiv : interesting things you need to know / text authors: Igor Makhtiienko, Viktoria Linchevskaya. (4th edition, 2019; MMLL have got the 2018 3rd edition)
We have also received a large number of new books in Ukrainian this week – blog post(s) about them to come.
Mel Bach
europeancollections.wordpress.com 