New opera brings stories of Ukraine’s war separated children to the stage
- Last updated: October 19, 2026 | 09:13
At the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, American playwright George Brant began writing an opera about Ukrainian mothers risking journeys into Russia to retrieve their children. As it premieres after more than four years of war, he hopes it will “re-awaken” Western concern for Ukraine.
A co-production between Poland’s National Opera and New York’s Metropolitan, “The Mothers of Kherson” will take to the stage in the Polish capital this week, before being shown in the United States in spring next year.
At a media pre-show, AFP saw opera singers filling an old bus on the stage of Warsaw’s Grand Theatre, with images of Soviet housing blocks behind it, telling the story of one of the most difficult topics of the war.
The opera, which is in English, closes in on Ukrainian women separated from their children by Russia’s invasion and their difficult journeys to get them back.
Kyiv says thousands of Ukrainian children were forcibly taken to Russia and Moscow-occupied territory and subjected to “re-education.” The opera comes at a precarious moment for Ukraine, with Western support increasingly fragile.
In the United States, where it will be shown in New York next year, President Donald Trump’s recent statements have made many in Kyiv and Europe wonder what side of the war the White House is on.
“It’s true the climate has changed, and my hope is that this is arriving at a good time to re-awaken people’s interest in this conflict... re-awaken their concern,” Brant said several days before the premiere.
“I think the story of the mothers cuts through political tape.” In 2022, he had looked for the right angle for the opera and was soon inspired by news reports about women braving hundreds of kilometres and Russian interrogations to get their children.
“It’s just a very human story that I hope will connect with people,” he said in Warsaw’s main opera house, which has hosted Ukrainian musicians since the start of the war. Russia’s Vladimir Putin and his children’s rights commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova are wanted by the International Criminal Court for what it calls war crimes.
The opera is inspired by women from the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, which fell to Russia in 2022 before being retaken by Kyiv, who wanted to bring their children home from Moscow-controlled Crimea.
To get to Russia or Russian-held territory, they had to go through Poland and then Moscow-allied Belarus and into “enemy territory”, as one of the characters sang on stage. With an ambitious set, the opera has scenes including a children’s camp in Crimea and a performer’s portrayal of a mother recording a scathing video to Lvova-Belova on Telegram.
It was produced in close association with Save Ukraine, a government group helping bring children back. Moscow denies these are deportations and has claimed it is taking the children to safety.
But Ukrainian teenagers who returned brought testimonies of indoctrination. The opera’s composer Maxim Kolomiiets said that while not everything in the opera is exactly how it happened, “we tried to keep it maximally realistic.”
“It’s about people, about love,” he said, adding that seeing the play come alive has been “as a composer, as a person and as a Ukrainian, the best feeling.”
Little is known about the life of Ukrainian children from occupied towns taken into Russia. But Moscow has handed out Russian passports on a massive scale, and some Russian officials adopted Ukrainian children and gave them Russian identities.
From her podium facing the orchestra, conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson directed the musicians, while several children took to the stage. She founded the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra when Russia invaded, and has mostly worked out of Warsaw’s Grand Theatre.
“The Mothers of Kherson” was created in record time, she said, out of a sense of urgency to bring it to world stages as the war drags on. Neither “words or sanctions” are solving this war, Wilson said, adding that her mission was to “keep the attention of Western society” on Ukraine.
“Beautiful music and drama magnifies this in a way a news cycle never could.” Meanwhile, Kyiv has begun installing mobile concrete shelters at public transport stops, an AFP reporter saw on Friday, as it grapples with air attacks and concern about the city’s preparedness for the looming winter. The Ukrainian capital has faced an increased number of Russian aerial strikes over the past weeks, with air raid sirens wailing nearly constantly. Round-the-clock attacks have hit residential areas, petrol stations, schools, rail and communications infrastructure and major bridges in the capital. As the four-and-a-half-year war shows no signs of stopping, the city’s administration erected a tent-shaped, concrete shelter for commuters at a bus stop.
“The shelter is intended to provide temporary protection for people in the event of shelling during air raid alerts,” Kyiv City State Administration said on Thursday. Kyiv, a city of three million people, plans to buy and install another 14 shelters, which provide seating for up to 10 people and space for a wheelchair, a statement read.
But the plan has drawn criticism from social media users and Ukrainian public figures over the pace of the roll-out. “The first mobile shelter in the fifth year of the war. It can accommodate 10 people... Well done – I’m lost for words,” one user, Ivan Tykhenko, posted to Facebook.
Ukrainian lawmaker Yaroslav Yurchyshyn said on social media that “the capital has been under attack from cruise missiles for three months, and now the people of Kyiv will have a chance to take cover.”
Agence France-Presse