In celebration of World Embroidery Day, which is observed annually on the third Thursday of May, students and faculty from the Department of Biology and Ecology visited an exhibition of embroidered towels from the family collection of Associate Professor Arthur Hennadiyovych Sirenko. The exhibition is taking place at the Museum of Arts of Prykarpattia.
The Sirenko family collection includes more than 300 towels from various ethnographic regions of Ukraine. The owners have spent about 30 years assembling it.
Arthur Hennadiyovych shared information about the ancient exhibits with the visitors. The embroidered towel is an ancient folk symbol. It is a ritual item dating back to pagan times. The very word “rushnyk” has the root “rush,” which means to break, destroy, tear, or otherwise—a torn piece of fabric, a cut.