Among various strange scandals plaguing an apparently suddenly neoliberal(?!) Flutgraben, my colleagues at Cultural Workers Studio are planning a weekend of workshops that mark the 2-year anniversary of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which created huge suffering and displacement that continues today, and the determined resistence.
Image:Your correspondant getting painted at a Cultural Workers Studio event in May, 2023.
The
workshops will feature 3 of my colleagues - the indeterminable Axxi
Oma, the scandalous Ann Krekhno, the unwaivering Olha Bohachevka, as
well as myself, leading participants on courses through a digital jouney
of the former factory Flutgraben that we have called home for
approximately 2 years now. Together with this, partners from the
Kyiv-based disability-access organisation On Equals and volunteer infrastructure rebuilding project YURBA,
will make presentations each morning - the former on "Inclusion of
people with disabilities in the cultural sector through creative social
projects”, and the latter on "Reintegration of de-occupied communities
through cultural interaction and social activities", while staying in
nearby apartments and breakfasting every morning with Kreuzberg's
finest.
The
weekend workshops are 4 months in the making, developed through
intensive collaboration with YURBA's dogged manager Tetiana Soloviova
and OnEquals' serene community-builder, Sofiia Lavreniuk, together with
my fantastic colleagues Hanna Liashenko and Olha Bohachevska. As well,
we are partnering with fantastic organisations: the Germany-based
collaboration organisation zusa, and the Ukraine-based infomal education organisation, Insha Osvita, which awarded us the grant through the "Culture Helps"
funding stream, and who (particularly the seemingly inexhaustable
Henrieke Moll) have gone extra lengths to support our
sometimes-complicated activities.
Such support and collaboration is direly needed at a point in the invasion where resistance is faltering, as the international political appetite for sincerity slowly gives way to cynicism, mostly through apathy and exhaustion. It is our hope to inject some much-needed cultural energy into the struggle for Ukrainian self-determination, one where a history of oppression and aggression has an opportunity to give way to a celebration of community and togetherness.
Further information on the weekend workshops can be found here:
Wanna join us for the weekend?
Here's the registration form below! (English and Ukrainian)
https://forms.gle/7XzrdP5zcyoTZwnx5
See you there!
