Netherlands-based miniature painter Bram has commission painted 102 models, most of them Warhammer 40k figures, to raise funds for the armed forces of Ukraine. So far he’s donated $4,100 (€3,800) to the charities United24 and Come Back Alive, and gifted two squads of Space Marines to Ukrainian soldiers.
Bram (who prefers not to give a surname) started fund-raising through Warhammer 40k in 2023 “by putting a squad of Space Marines on eBay for auction”. After doing this for some a while he was asked to paint up a commission, and now that’s the mainstay of what he produces. “The proceeds go to charities and in most cases I pay for the miniatures, shipping, and other expenses out of pocket”, he says.
When painting miniatures for these commissions, Bram says “I stick to the blue and yellow [of the Ukrainian flag] combined with decals from actual Ukrainian military units, like the 93rd and 72nd mechanized, 25th airborne or the 79th air assault brigade”. It’s the kind of bold primary color scheme that works perfectly for a Space Marine chapter.
Most of the commissions are for Space Marine squads, though the work “also includes dreadnoughts, vehicles, an Imperial Knight, Sisters of Battle, and some historical and modern miniatures and busts”.
He’s added extra detail to most of the projects, usually “a small diorama like a trenchline, woodlands or urban setting”. “I also have a small legion of miniatures in my pile of shame waiting to be finished”, he notes. We can relate.
Which paints for miniatures does Bram use to match the colors of the Ukrainian flag? “For the blue I use AK 3rd generation”, he says, with ‘dark Prussian blue’ for the shadow, ‘dark blue’ for the mid-tone, and ‘deep blue – intense’ for the highlight. “For the yellow I use Averland Sunset with multiple layers of 50/50 medium and Casandora Yellow to give it a deeper, more intense hue.”
To get a good fix for the decals, he applies “a liberal coat of gloss varnish” to the model surface, uses “microsol and microset to place them”, before finishing with a “few thin coats of ultra matt varnish to unify the model in a matt look”.
He’s very proud of the models that he’s donated to Ukrainian soldiers. “One of those squads is a tactical squad of out-of-production metal Space Wolves with the 36th Ukrainian Marine Brigade insignia, a very fitting Viking ship”. He recalls how he “told the marine who got them, that in a worst case scenario he can throw them really hard at the enemy, they would probably hurt”.
Bram has recently finished his first army commission, and he’s proud of his work. “The dreadnoughts are organized into groups of three, so the three Brutalis all share the insignia of the 72nd mechanized whilst the Ballistus all have Kraken SOF insignia and so forth” he says, adding that “each group of three includes a banner0carrying dreadnought, as if it was their sergeant”.
He adds that the “most emotional model I painted was a little refugee girl holding her teddy bear in 1/35 scale, made by Ukrainian scale model company Master Box”. You can find more pictures of Bram’s work on his Instagram.
Bram doesn’t have a direct personal connection to Ukraine, per se, but it came to his attention back in 2014. Ukraine was then poised to join the EU, but its then president Viktor Yanukovych signed a deal with Russia, sparking pro democracy protests and ultimately the “Revolution of Dignity”. Yanukovych fled to Russia, and Russia invaded Ukraine, annexing Crimea and channelling resources to rebels in the Donbas.
On July 17 2014, Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 traveling from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur Malaysia was shot down over Eastern Ukraine by Russian backed rebels, using a Russian Buk 9M38 surface-to-air missile launcher. All 283 passengers and 15 crew were killed, including 80 children. It was massive news in the Netherlands – as Bram recalls, “196 of the victims were my fellow Dutch countrymen”. A Dutch court ruled Russia to be ultimately responsible for the actions of the rebels.
Bram says, “what I saw in Ukraine back then was a poor, divided, and for centuries abused country throwing off the shackles of its Soviet past and defying a much larger, stronger, richer, nuclear armed dictatorship by choosing democracy and freedom”.
Bram says that all the proceeds from his sales “go to two Ukrainian charities split evenly”, United24, and Come Back Alive. United24 is a Ukrainian government initiative which supports a variety of war related causes, including aid, defense, demining, and reconstruction, but Bram says “I exclusively donate towards defense”.
Come Back Alive provides military aid. It publishes records of all donations it receives and where that money is spent live on its site (though this data is provided in Ukrainian).
If you’re interested in the impact of the war in Ukraine on Warhammer 40k hobbyists there, we recently caught up with master papercrafter Denys Tsiokhla about three years making custom miniatures under fire – check out this feature to learn more.
Source: Wargamer
