At the one-day symposium “Protecting Cultural Heritage in Times of War – Learning from Ukraine”, experts discussed the current state of cultural heritage protection in Ukraine and Switzerland with a special focus on wartime planning. Experts from Ukraine reported on the daunting challenges that have been imposed on their country by Russia’s brutal war of aggression, but also on innovative forms of dealing with the situation.
Tetyana Pylypchuk, Director of the Kharkiv Literary Museum, spoke of destruction but also about a novel exhibition which compares the 1920s – the ‘executed renaissance’ – with the present situation. Dariia Diakova, Director of the Museum for Change (MFC) and deputy Director of the Odesa National Fine Arts Museum informed about MFC’s practical support for many other museums, e.g. with respect to evacuating collections and stabilizing buildings. MFC’s work is supported by the ALIPH Foundation, represented at the symposium by Alexandra Fiebich, who is also acting Director of the Ukraine Cultural Heritage Fund. Yurii Prepodobnyi, Co-founder of company Skeiron, informed the audience that his company, shortly after the beginning of the full-skale invasion, switched to scanning historic buildings in Ukraine, thus testifying to Ukraine’s vibrant civil society.
At an expert workshop, in panel discussions and guided tours through the collection of Bern History Museum, representatives of Swiss museums and the administrations at national, Canton and city level reflected the information received from the Ukrainian experts. The outcome of the symposium are recommendations on how to upgrade emergency planning with regard to cultural heritage protection in war.
The symposium was jointly organized by Bern History Museum and the Ukraine Culture Network, with special thanks to Maria Söderberg and Christian Schoenenberger, members of the UCN Board. The organizers express their gratitude for the support by the Embassies of Ukraine, Finland, Norway and Sweden.
The program of the symposium can be found under this link.
Photo credits: Kharkiv Literary Museum
photo credits: Dariia Diakova
photo credits: Ukraine Culture Network
