#Oksana Lysenko

[vintage-ukraine]

Oksana Lysenko`s illustration for “The Witch of Konotop” by Hryhoriy Kvitka-Osnovianenko, 1983

[freifraufischer]

The geopolitics that left two of Ukraine’s best gymnasts out of the Olympics...

The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 was very awkward in it’s timing from a sporting point of view.  Most spots for the 1992 Olympic Games were gained by USSR teams competing in that year but by the next the country didn’t exist.  It was decided to allow the former Soviet Republics (other than the Baltic States that had become independent earlier) to compete as the Unified Team under the Olympic banner for team events with their individual country’s flag and anthems for individual events.

This makes one of the traditional debates about the 1992 Olympics a bit complicated one Tatiana Gutsu fell in her optional beam exercise and Rosa Galieva finished ahead of her.  In any year previous there would be no question that a Soviet coach could decide substitute a gymnast with perceived greater medal potential.  It had happened in 1985 at the world championships and 1990 at the Goodwill Games.  But when the AA was an individual competition was it right that a Russian coach could pull an Uzbek gymnast in favor of a Ukrainian?  Mostly this is a debate only American gymnastics fans care about because of it’s implications for the Gutsu vs Miller all around battle.

But it does highlight just how complicated the Unified Team was as an organization.  One might say that they simply behaved like it was a USSR team ... but let me show you how they didn’t from the very beginning.

Let’s start with the 1992 European Championships which was the first gymnastics meet where these gymnasts competed under their own flags and which happened before the 1992 Olympic Games.  Here are the results from the AA with the non-former Soviet countries removed.

1 Tatiana Gutsu UKR 39.725 4 Tatiana Lysenko UKR 39.137 5 Svetlana Boginskaya BLR 39.136 6 Ludmilla Stovbchataya UKR 39.061 10 Elena Grudneva RUS 38.849

4 of these 5 gymnasts would be on the 6 person 1992 Unified Team.  Their names are bolded.

It should be noted that a number of relevant gymnasts couldn’t compete in 1992 Euros because their new countries were in Asia so this excludes Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan athletes who will be relevant to this conversation later.

Now let’s look at the 1992 CIS Championships.  The CIS was the temporary successor organization to the USSR for this transition.  I have added their country listing at the time.

1 Tatiana Lysenko 39.725 - UKR 2 Roza Galiyeva 39.412 - UZB 3 Oksana Chusovitina 39.099 - UZB 4 Svetlana Boginskaya 38.950 - BLR 5 Natalia Kalinina 38.862 - UKR 6 Tatiana Gutsu 38.825 - UKR 7 Anna Zaitseva 38.687 - KAZ 7 Ludmilla Stovbchataya 38.687 - UKR 9 Svetlana Kozlova 38.487 - RUS 10 Elena Grudneva 38.450 - RUS

I have bolded the members of the Unified Team.  Gutsu won 3 of the CIS Championships event finals on vault, bars, and beam.  Stovbchataya won the event final on floor.

During the USSR period it was entirely possible for the team selectors to creat a team with no Russian gymnasts.  They had in 1989 at the World Championships where the team had been made up of 2 Ukrainians, 2 Latvians and 2 Belarussians.  But they did not pick the Unified Team blind to country of origin.  There had to be a Russian on the team and so they skipped over two Ukrainians who had better results (and a Kazak) in order to put Elena Grudneva on the 1992 Olympic team.

I suspect that if Ukraine had been allowed to compete as it’s own country in 1992 they could have won the gold outright.

Natalia Kalinina was one of the greatest gymnasts never to make an Olympic Team.  She was a member of the 1991 USSR World Championship team that had won gold and had beaten Boginskaya in 1990 to take the 1990 Goodwill Games AA.  The above video is from that performance.  She was a stunning classical floor worker.  She continued to compete for Ukraine for a few years after being snubbed from the 1992 selection.

This is Ludmilla Stovbchataya’s 1992 European Championships EF Beam.

She won the bronze behind Gutsu and Boginskaya.

Stovbchataya would continue to complete for Ukraine as well for a few years past the 1992 Olympics.  

[carmenvicinanza]

Oksana Lyniv

https://www.unadonnalgiorno.it/oksana-lyniv/

Bisogna far diventare la musica un’immagine nella mente e nella fantasia del pubblico e questo non accade spontaneamente, bisogna prepararsi e secondo me è importante anche conoscere il compositore, i tempi in cui ha vissuto, quali erano i suoi autori di riferimento, anche le sue lettere. Questi dettagli musicologici e biografici sono importanti, ma l’ispirazione viene dal talento e dalla sensibilità dell’interprete. Un musicologo non è un direttore d’orchestra. Bisogna tradurre tutto questo con suoni e sentimento, insieme all’orchestra.

Oksana Lyniv è la direttrice d’orchestra ucraina nominata al vertice del Teatro Comunale di Bologna, carica mai ricoperta in precedenza da una donna in un teatro d’opera italiano.

Nata a Brody il 6 gennaio 1978, è figlia di musicisti e nipote di un direttore di coro. In gioventù ha studiato pianoforte, flauto, violino e canto. Dal 1992 al 1996 ha studiato flauto e direzione d’orchestra alla Stanislav Liudkevych Music School di Lviv. La prima volta che ha diretto un’orchestra aveva 16 anni.

Ha studiato all’Accademia di musica Lysenko di Lviv, dal 1996 al 2003, anno in cui è diventata direttrice ospite principale della Leopolis Chamber Symphony Orchestra.

Nel 2004 ha partecipato al primo concorso di direzione di Gustav Mahler dell’Orchestra Sinfonica di Bamberga vincendo il terzo premio.

Dal 2008 al 2013 è stata direttrice principale associata dell’Odessa National Opera. Ha lavorato alla creazione di un’orchestra giovanile nazionale in Ucraina e fatto parte dello staff di direzione dell‘Opera di Stato bavarese, come assistente alla direzione di Kirill Petrenko fino al 2017.

È stata la prima donna nominata direttrice principale dell’Opera e dell’Orchestra Filarmonica di Graz dal 2017 al 2020 e anche la prima a salire sul podio del prestigioso Festival di Bayreuth il 25 luglio 2021 con L’Olandese volante.

Nel marzo dello stesso anno, in un concerto in streaming a causa della quarantena, ha fatto la sua prima apparizione come direttrice ospite al Teatro Comunale di Bologna, dove, due mesi dopo, ha tenuto un concerto con la presenza del pubblico.

In ottobre 2021, l’ente ha annunciato la nomina di Oksana Lyniv come nuova direttrice musicale, a partire da gennaio 2022, con un contratto di 3 anni.

Quando dirige, ha un gesto agile che lancia l’orchestra e uno stile incisivo, pieno di personalità. E non ha alcuna remora a farsi chiamare direttrice, anzi ne va fiera. A lei auguriamo tutto il meglio auspicandoci che faccia da apripista per tante altre donne sul podio dell’opera nel paese del Belcanto.

[pastdaily]

[freifraufischer]

Oksana Chusovitina’s twin sister Tatyana Lysenko.

[souris-ala-vie]

[wxmxn]

Oksana Lysenko

Instagram - Twitter - Tumblr

[oksanaglos]

New year, new you?

Raise your hand if your resolution was to get in shape this year (and probably all the previous years). One way to pump up that inner motivation is by wearing some stylin' new gear that'll make you look good, even if you don't feel your body is up to par with your goals. I'm more of a form-fitted sportswear lover, and wear short sleeve or sleeveless only. I find loose clothing makes me overheat, which then makes me feel nauseous, which means, you won't be seeing me inside of a Bikram Yoga studio anytime soon. Even though I've been on a workout hiatus recently, these items are revving up that little engine back up inside of me… 

Shop The Gear: 1. Fishnet racerback bra  2. Duffle bag 3. Black and white sportsbra 4. Running tights 5. Nike Air Max's 6. Rose gold headphones 7. Water bottle 8. Adidas by Stella McCartney sneakers 9. Leggings