Peacebuilding and the Arts

Conference: Revolutions of Hope: Resilience and Recovery in Ukraine
University of Notre Dame, Indiana, USA
March 6-8
“What we are witnessing in Ukraine, after Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, might be described as ‘integral human destruction’—the destruction not only of human life, the natural environment, and tangible infrastructure, but also of intangible infrastructure through misinformation, the erosion of trust, and the creation of a climate of terror.

The conference will focus on the positive and corrective response to this destruction, exploring reasons for hope, sources of hope, and the politics and ethics of hope in Ukraine. How is hope powerful or even revolutionary? How does it encourage resilience and recovery? And, above all, how can we build and promote the integral development of hope in Ukraine? The conference will explore the concept, dynamics, and practices of hope through keynote addresses, panel discussions, the arts, and liturgical observances.”

Conference: Art for Tomorrow
Milan, Italy
May 12-14

Includes sessions on art and war, and art and migration. “In 2025 the world is facing unprecedented challenges, many of them rooted in the inequalities that have only been exacerbated by the triple threat of political, economic and climate crises. These challenges can lead to fracture and isolation, turning away from each other instead of coming together, and leaving the most vulnerable behind. But change will only come if we turn outward instead of inward, to our friends, our communities and our planet.

Art for Tomorrow 2025 is about tapping into this shared humanity to learn about creative solutions to the most entrenched problems. From May 12-14, we will convene influential figures from the arts, design and architecture in Milan, to explore the impact that these fields can and do have on society.” 

Interview: Daria Pugachova: beauty and fear in performative art
By Anni Schleicher/VATAHA Platform for Ukrainian Art and Culture in The Netherlands/January 10, 2025
“In 2023, I interviewed multidisciplinary artist Daria Pugachova about her Cities of War performance in front of the International Court of Justice in the Hague. Since our interview in the Netherlands, Daria has performed and worked in Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Norway and the US, where she has just completed a four-week residency in Houston, Texas. One year later, we reconnected to discuss the element of fear in art, changing audience perceptions of art, her experiences with other international refugees, and her own personal transformation as a performative artist.”


Book: Diaries of War: Two Visual Accounts from Ukraine and Russia
By Nora Krug/Ten Speed Press/2023
“Immediately after Russia began its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Nora Krug reached out to two anonymous subjects – 'K.,' a Russia-born Ukrainian journalist, and 'D.,' a Russian artist – and began what would become a year of correspondence. Based on her weekly interviews with K. and D., Krug created this collection of illustrated accounts that chronicles two viewpoints from opposite sides of the border throughout the first year in this ongoing war.”


Book: Зцілення Ран Конфлікту. Медіація Може Допомогти (in Ukrainian)
English translation: Healing the Wounds of Conflict: Mediation Can Help
Co-authors of the Ukrainian edition: Alain Lempereur, Jacques Salzer, Aurélien Colson, Iryna Kordunian [Brandeis University International Business School MBA ‘25], Michele Pekar, Eugene B. Kogan.
“Published in 2024 in Kyiv, Healing the Wounds of Conflict. Mediation Can Help is a Ukrainian adaptation of the renowned English-language book Mediation. Negotiation by Other Moves. Co-authored by Alain Lempereur, Jacques Salzer, Aurélien Colson, Iryna Kordunian, Michele Pekar, and Eugene B. Kogan, this book is a testament to international solidarity with Ukraine. The book was made possible through collaboration with the Ukrainian Academy of Mediation and with the support of the European Union. This partnership helped bring the book to Ukrainian readers, ensuring it is freely available so that every Ukrainian can access the best mediation practices.

This book serves as a companion for those who are already mediators, those who may become mediators, individuals engaged in mediation, and anyone impacted by conflict. It guides readers step by step—from moments when resolution seems impossible to the signing and implementation of agreements. Through real-life insights and structured methodologies, it helps readers navigate conflict by understanding the past, recognizing present needs, and co-creating sustainable solutions.

At its core, this book is a signal of hope. The cover features a vibrant sunflower, a powerful symbol of resilience and the bright future of Ukraine. Deeply rooted in Ukrainian culture, the sunflower represents hope, unity, and renewal, mirroring the book’s vision of healing through mediation.”


Podcast: Making Peace Visible Episode 65: From Ukraine, War Reporting that Feels Personal
Making Peace Visible: Peace and Conflict in the Media/December 5, 2024
“Photographer Anastasia Taylor-Lind and writer Alisa Sopova create intimate, accessible portraits of Ukrainian civilians living close to the frontlines of the Russian invasion. Sometimes their subjects are picnicking in a park or tending a garden. Other times, they’re repairing a ceiling damaged by shelling or waiting for departure on an evacuation train. Anastasia and Alisa have been working together in Ukraine since the Maidan Revolution, also known as the ‘Revolution of Dignity’ in 2014. And over the years, they’ve returned to visit the same families, witnessing how the war touches men, women, and children over time.”

“Anthropologists view war and peace not as opposites but as something that is happening simultaneously. War is happening, but normal life, or so-called normal life or normalized life, it's happening alongside war. And so we want to show not just the spectacular events, but also how people live through it on a day-to-day level. But then the ethical question is how to do it without normalizing it.” – Alisa Sopova (in the podcast)


Article: 3 Years Into War, Ukrainian Musicians Ask, ‘Will We Ever Go Home?’
By Javier Hernandez/The New York Times/February 4, 2025
“The [Kyiv Symphony Orchestra’s] musicians were welcomed in the German city of Gera for two years, and when that came to an end [violinist Tetiana Martyniuk-Bahrii] felt lucky that Monheim am Rhein, a town of about 40,000 along the Rhine River, invited them to a two-year cultural residency. It provided a much-needed haven for the 73 musicians and their families at a moment when the support of Western governments for Ukraine seemed to be softening, and many places appeared less welcoming toward refugees. More than 1,000 days after she and her fellow musicians were first displaced, Martyniuk-Bahrii, 44, said she had grown accustomed to the uncertainty. ‘It’s a life, but I can’t say it’s a totally happy life,’ she said. ‘Who knows what will be next?’”

Article: For These Teenagers in Ukraine, Hope Arrived at the Stage Door
By Kim Barker and Dzvinka Pinchuk/The New York Times/January 14, 2025
“Ms. [Olesia] Korzhenevska wrote a new play for every acting class. After the invasion, she focused on war stories because many students had loved ones fighting near the front lines… Ms. Korzhenevska noticed right away that the vibe in 2024 was different. Everyone needed a break from the war. She wanted to help the students imagine themselves in a more predictable, more routine environment. Someplace like America, Ms. Korzhenevska thought, where none of them had ever been.”

Article: Dark humour for dark times: How comedy helps in Ukraine
By Vitaliy Shevchenko/BBC/January 22, 2025
“On 14 October 2023, an unusual event was held in Ukraine's most prestigious venue, Palace Ukraine in Kyiv. Anton Tymoshenko became the first Ukrainian stand-up comedian to give a solo performance there. ‘I grew up in a village with fewer people than Palace Ukraine can hold,’ he said after the concert. ‘So many people had told me: It's not going to happen... stand-up comedy has not reached that level.’
It has now, to a large extent because of the full-scale invasion launched by Russia.”

Archive Project: Documenting Ukraine
“Through Documenting Ukraine, the IWM [Institute for Human Sciences] supports scholars, journalists, public intellectuals, artists, and archivists based in Ukraine as they work on documentation projects that establish and preserve a factual record—whether through reporting, gathering published source material, or collecting oral testimony—or that bring meaning to events through intellectual reflection and artistic interpretation. Ultimately, the materials collected and produced through these projects will be housed in a complex, transdisciplinary archive.

This is a project that centers Ukrainian intellectual work: the projects are conceived, developed, and carried out by Ukrainians, and Documenting Ukraine grantees retain full intellectual property rights to any work they produce. The same thinking underpins the archive that will result from the project: any materials contributed by people we are supporting are an important part of Ukraine’s intellectual heritage.”
Contributions to Documenting Ukraine are welcome.

Movie: Porcelain War
Directed by Slava Leontyev and Brendan Bellomo/2024
“Amidst the chaos and destruction of the brutal Russian invasion of Ukraine, three artists defiantly find inspiration and beauty as they defend their culture and their country. In a war waged by professional soldiers against ordinary civilians, Slava Leontyev, Anya Stasenko, and Andrey Stefanov choose to stay behind, armed with their art, their cameras, and, for the first time in their lives, their guns. Despite daily shelling, Anya finds resistance and purpose in her art, Andrey takes the dangerous journey to get his young family to safety abroad, and Slava becomes a weapons instructor for ordinary people who have become unlikely soldiers. As the war intensifies, Andrey picks up his camera to film their story, and on tiny porcelain figurines, Anya and Slava capture their idyllic past, uncertain present, and hope for the future… Porcelain War embodies the passion and fight that only an artist can put back into the world when it’s crumbling around them.”

Porcelain War has been nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film. It will be screened at Brandeis University on Sunday, March 30 at 3:00 pm in the Wasserman Cinematheque at the International Business School. Free and open to the public. See details.

About the movie: The Crazy Story on How the ‘Porcelain War’ Co-Directors Made a Doc 6,000 Miles Apart
By Brendan Bellomo/The Hollywood Reporter/February 7, 2025
“From the start, Slava Leontyev and I, as co-directors of the documentary feature Porcelain War, realized that we had a problem. Actually, a few. Big ones. To begin with, there was this: Slava is a porcelain artist turned Special Forces soldier in Ukraine, I am a VFX supervisor in the U.S., and neither of us had ever directed a documentary before.
We were separated by 6,000 miles, a language barrier and the largest conflict in Europe since World War II. We had never met in person and maybe never would. Our first Zoom was filled with sounds of nearby Russian shelling and a translator struggling to keep up with two people who didn’t speak the same language trying to make a film in a war zone. In our very first Zoom, Slava said: ‘All war is ugly; it all looks the same. The destruction. The smoke. The bodies. We’ve seen all this in other films. What we should show is the beauty of our country — everything that we are fighting to defend.’”

Conference recording: Landscapes of War, Landscapes of Victory: Ukraine’s Changing Environment 
Temerty Contemporary Ukraine Conference/Harvard University Ukrainian Research Institute/Feb 7- 8, 2025
“The 2025 TCUP Conference [addressed] how Ukrainians are being denied their right to build (and rebuild) a safe environment due to Russia’s continued aggression. Panels [discussed] the geopolitical landscape in which the war is being waged; ecocide and environmental crimes; the (re)built environment; and the landscape of digital technologies contributing to reconstruction.”

Song: Don’t Abandon Them
By the Marsh Family
February 14, 2025
“We put together this version of Dylan's iconic rhetorical question song from 1963, ‘Blowin' in the Wind’ because so much is hanging in the air at the moment… But what better use to make of Valentine's night than to show love and respect for the courage and sacrifice of the people of Ukraine, and send a small musical message of solidarity?”

Advocacy: Ukraine and the battle of Europe
by André Wilkens, Director of European Cultural Foundation
“Our Ukrainian friends continue their heroic fight. They remind us that this is about Europe, and they are right. For Putin, this war is not just about Ukraine; it is about rewriting European history and redrawing borders. It is a battle for Europe.”
These are words by our Director marking this bitter anniversary. On this page, we highlight our work, projects supported by the Culture of Solidarity Fund and the Ukrainian The Europe Challenge initiatives. Read on to learn more about how they had to cope with the new reality.
We open this page with a call to European policymakers to wholeheartedly support Ukrainian cultural sectors with a European Cultural Deal for Ukraine: “Culture and Cultural heritage are pivotal to Ukraine’s past, present and future and deserve full attention for their intrinsic value but also for what they can bring to society: hope, inspiration and creative imagination, economic, social and cultural value.”