{"id":39707,"date":"2022-06-29T18:26:11","date_gmt":"2022-06-30T00:26:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-artist-recounts-trip-to-help-ukrainian-refugees-plans-a-second-visit\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:51:25","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:51:25","slug":"durango-artist-recounts-trip-to-help-ukrainian-refugees-plans-a-second-visit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-artist-recounts-trip-to-help-ukrainian-refugees-plans-a-second-visit\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango artist recounts trip to help Ukrainian refugees; plans a second visit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Durango
Durango artist Suzanne Horwich, right, and a Ukrainian refugee named Marina make art during Horwich\u2019s weeklong stay in Krakow, Poland, in May. Horwich delivered art supplies to refugees. She plans to return to Poland in July to continue supporting refugees through art. (Courtesy of Suzanne Horwich)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Durango artist Suzanne Horwich didn\u2019t expect Ukrainian refugees to have such a strong impact on her. But after spending a week with them making art in Poland, she plans a return visit in July.<\/p>\n

On her first trip in May, Horwich had a red suitcase filled with art supplies \u2013 watercolors, pastels, markers and beads \u2013 that she wheeled into a courtyard in Krakow near the site of a refugee relief operation. She organized art stations in the courtyard \u2013 an \u201cinvitation to play or create,\u201d as she called it.<\/p>\n

Hundreds of refugees, mostly women, children and the elderly, lined up every morning to receive food and supplies from the relief site. She could see the interest on their faces and invited them to join her at an art station.<\/p>\n

But interest wasn\u2019t the only thing she noticed.<\/p>\n

\"A
A Ukrainian woman named Marina joined Durango artist Suzanne Horwich for art sessions during Horwich\u2019s recent trip to Poland to help Ukrainian refugees. The Ukrainian woman spoke no English, Horwich said, but the two women sat for hours \u201cspeaking the international language of art.\u201d (Courtesy of Suzanne Horwich)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

She said women carried a burden on their shoulders because their husbands were often either fighting, being held captive or dead. Mothers smiled as a sign of reassurance for their children, but it was obvious they were trying to keep it together inside, Horwich said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese women are in a completely new country with their children and often with their own mothers,\u201d she said. \u201cThere are hardly any men.\u201d<\/p>\n

Children made art with Horwich while their mothers waited in line for food and supplies, she said. The mothers joined the children after they left the line and would sit and create art for hours.<\/p>\n

\u201cSitting with other women and creating and offering them coffee and listening to music together and laughing \u2013 they would come back day after day,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Horwich organized her first trip in May through the Jewish Community Center Krakow. She originally planned to keep the refugees\u2019 art to make an art installation. But she found many of the refugees didn\u2019t want to part with their art, so the installation never came together.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt wasn\u2019t feeling right: \u2018Hey, let\u2019s create, and now I\u2019m going to take it away and hang it in a building,\u2019\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Horwich is still interested in the possibly of creating an art installation on her next trip, but her primary focus will be using art as a vehicle for healing.<\/p>\n

The most important thing for the refugees, aside from emergency services, is returning their sense of dignity, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course these people are victims. But we have to start looking at these people as humans and return their dignity,\u201d Horwich said. \u201cIt\u2019s so important for them to move forward and succeed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Horwich set out for Poland to make a positive impact on the refugees who fled Ukraine. But she didn\u2019t realize the impact they would have on her.<\/p>\n

After a day of painting and creating she would return to her hotel room and cry. She said she wasn\u2019t moved by sorrow but by an \u201coverwhelming appreciation for resilience.\u201d<\/p>\n

She met other humanitarian aid workers during her stay. She recalled meeting a group of Canadians who had volunteered to fight with the Ukrainian military.<\/p>\n

Refugees showed her cellphone footage of their escape from Russian troops with gunfire audible in the background.<\/p>\n

She met a man who decided to escape Ukraine along with his daughters. When Horwich asked the man why he left instead of staying to fight as other men had, he told her he was afraid for his daughters because of reports of rape committed by Russian soldiers.<\/p>\n

A 17- or 18-year-old woman told Horwich that getting on buses to make it across the border to Poland was \u201cawful\u201d because people were told they couldn\u2019t bring their pets, and they had to leave other belongings behind.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis one family in particular spent seven hours driving through Ukraine trying to avoid Russian checkpoints,\u201d Horwich said. \u201cThey said the only reason they got out was it was raining and their papers weren\u2019t checked, and they made it to the border.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A
A Ukrainian girl colors during a creative session with Durango resident and artist Suzanne Horwich. Horwich traveled to Poland in May to lift the spirits of Ukrainian refugees and is planning a return two-week trip beginning July 11. (Courtesy of Suzanne Horwich)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Horwich made art with refugees and handed out art supplies for them to keep at three different locations during her weeklong stay. Two locations were in Krakow, but a third was located at the Palace of Paszk\u00f3wka, also known as the Palace of the People, outside the city that housed 40 Ukrainian families living together as a community.<\/p>\n

She said a Denver businessman, an American Hollywood actor and JCC Krakow pitched in to rent the palace for the families, although she couldn\u2019t recall the actor\u2019s and businessman\u2019s names.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs I continue to explore how this program can assist people, I\u2019m sure it will change,\u201d she said. \u201cBut it\u2019s still really the general idea of art being the vehicle to deliver the healing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Horwich leaves July 11 for a two-week trip to Krakow, Poland, she said. She started blogging nightly about her experiences while there the first time and plans to keep that up. Her blog can be found at http:\/\/www.artistsgivingback.org\/<\/a>.<\/p>\n

cburney@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Suzanne Horwich uses art as a \u2018vehicle for healing\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":39708,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[363,246,364,3323,950,28,714,1147],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-39707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-arts","tag-arts-general","tag-community","tag-conflicts-and-war","tag-durango","tag-headlines","tag-human-interest","tag-war"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39707"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39707\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84415,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39707\/revisions\/84415"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39707"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=39707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}