365 Days of War

24 February 2023 marks the anniversary of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation. One year later, air raid warnings and shelling, fear and displacement are still part of everyday life for Ukrainians. According to expert forecasts, it seems that an end to the war remains a long way off. On this occasion, Office Ukraine Innsbruck, hosted by Künstlerhaus Büchsenhausen, has initiated art projects and events in collaboration with several Ukrainian artists and local cooperation partners.

The platform Office Ukraine was founded shortly after the beginning of Russia’s large-scale war of aggression against Ukraine and since then has been supporting artists and cultural workers from Ukraine who have found shelter in Austria.

The following projects will be realized and presented in and around Innsbruck at the end of February:

365 Days of War
Kristina Kapeljuh
Poster series | 4 posters with 6 infographics each (risograph prints)

20 February – 5 March 2023
Public space (street columns) Innsbruck

Not to forget and not to accept war as a normality – this is the aim of the art project by Kristina Kapeljuh, a Ukrainian-born artist currently living in Innsbruck. In collaboration with Office Ukraine Innsbruck, Kristina Kapeljuh has designed graphics based on statistical data referring to the war and its consequences, which she printed with a risograph and assembled into four different posters. As of 20 February 2023, the posters will be on display in the streets of Innsbruck for two weeks.

No Title, no Plans
Miki-Mike 665
Mural

Presentation on 23 February 2023, 15.00
University Bridge underpass (south, next to the university)

With his mural designed for the occasion of February 24, Ukrainian artist Miki-Mike 665 brings the reality of Ukrainians into the center of Innsbruck. On the wall of the University Bridge South underpass, he creates an intense storytelling that shows the reality people in Ukraine are facing since the beginning of the full-scale war and connects it with the local historical and contemporary context.

Ira Kurhanska: 365 Days – Russia‘s War Against Me
Radio broadcast on Freirad (Freies Radio Innsbruck)

24 February 2023, 16.00
Rerun: Sat 25 February 2023, 20.00
Radio Freirad

What was the everyday life of people in Ukraine like during the past 365 days and how do they manage to carry on? How can one survive the complete destruction of one’s previous life without going crazy? Can one get used to rockets flying over one’s head on a regular basis (which is actually easier in the current situation of recurring blackouts)? Ira Kurhanska (Office Ukraine – Shelter for Ukrainian Artists), a displaced Ukrainian currently living in Innsbruck, will guide you through the daily life of people in and from Ukraine. We will dive into what happened throughout the past year under the surface of local news on this topic – from music and DJ tracks about the war, diaries and poems, stand-up excerpts and TikTok shorts, memes and facts.

Remember the Smell of Mariupol
Zoya Laktionova
Experimental film, Ukraine, Austria, 2022, 4:33

24 February 2023
The short film will be shown before every screening in Leokino und Cinematograph
Q&A with the filmmaker: 18.00 in Leokino

In Remember the Smell of Mariupol (2022), Mariupol-born filmmaker Zoya Laktionova recounts her experiences since the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine. The short film will be shown on 24 February 2023 in Leokino and Cinematograph (Innsbruck) before each scheduled screening. At 18.00, before the screening of Signs of War, a collaboration between the Centre for Eastern European Studies and Leokino (see below), Zoya Laktionova will join us online for a short Q&A session in Leokino.

 

Events by cooperation partners and supporting institutions and initiatives:

Вечір єдності
Conversation evening in Ukrainian, organized by the Cultural Platform Ukraine-Tirol
23 February 2023, 18.00
Die Bäckerei, Dreiheiligenstraße 21a, 6020 Innsbruck

On 23 February 2023, the cultural platform Ukraine-Tyrol invites people affected by the Russo-Ukrainian war to spend the eve of the anniversary together. “The best thing to do on the anniversary of the war is to come together, to be there for each other. We will meet to talk, to listen to each other. To express ourselves, to say what hurts us, to support each other and to share our warmth.”
Places are limited. Please register here: https://forms.gle/FiNWDw8KnGMyHtFb8

The Distant Barking of Dogs
Screening in Kunstraum Schwaz
23. 02. 2023, 19.00

Kunstraum Schwaz in collaboration with Office Ukraine invites to a screening and subsequent discussion on 23 February, 19.00. For The Distant Barking of Dogs (2017), Simon Lereng Wilmont accompanied ten-year-old Oleg, who lives in eastern Ukraine, and his grandmother over a period of one year and shows what it is like to grow up in a war zone.

Signs of War
Screening in Leokino in cooperation with the Centre for Eastern European Studies of the University of Innsbruck
Film release: 24 February 2023
Discussion: 6 March 2023

In cooperation with the Centre for Eastern European Studies of the University of Innsbruck, Leokino presents the film Signs of War (release: 24 February) – an impressive interview film that gives the perspective of a contemporary witness of the war in Ukraine since 2014 – the French photographer Pierre Crom. Director Yuri Rechinsky, who grew up in Ukraine, skilfully works with two central media of remembering and documenting: photography and narrated history. On Mon 6 March, 18.00, Pierre Crom will present himself to the Innsbruck cinema audience in conversation with Eva Binder, head of the Centre for Eastern European Studies .