In March 2025, the Past / Future / Art memory culture platform held public discussions about the occupation resistance experience in Kherson and Crimea as part of the Unseen Force exhibition, which the Odesa National Fine Arts Museum hosted from February 7 to April 13, 2025.
Unseen Force is an art exhibition that aims to raise awareness about the nonviolent resistance of Ukrainians in the territories temporarily occupied by Russia, including resistance movements and methods; informational, art, and women’s resistance; and real stories of standing up to the Russian aggression. The exhibition was held in Kyiv, Lviv, Dnipro, and Odesa.
In Odesa, the project partnered with the Past / Future / Art memory culture platform, with Oksana Dovgopolova taking on the roles of discussion curator and moderator.
DISCUSSION PROGRAM
CRIMEAN OCCUPATION EXPERIENCE: WHAT ARE WE TALKING ABOUT WHEN WE TALK ABOUT CRIMEA?
March 14, 2025
4:00 pm
Odesa National Fine Arts Museum
5a Sofiivska St., Odesa
Speakers: Martin-Oleksandr Kisly, Alena Lunova, Fevzi Mamutov, Mavile Khalil
Moderator: Oksana Dovgopolova
Crimea fell under occupation in 2014—earlier than any other temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine. A generation that knows nothing about what it’s like to live in Ukraine has grown up since then. Meanwhile, some people in Crimea are still a threat to the occupational Russian authorities. After 2014, the Ukrainians started seeing Crimea in a new light. Still, everybody got used to the peninsula’s separate existence. Can it be returned? Can it live again as a part of Ukraine? And what can we do today to make it happen?
Martin-Oleksandr Kisly, Cand. Sc. History and lecturer at the National University of Kyiv Mohyla Academy; Alena Lunova, Advocacy Director at Human Rights Center ZMINA; Fevzi Mamutov, Head of the Crimean Tatars of Odesa Region NGO and People’s Deputy of the Odesa Oblast Council; Mavile Khalil, Crimean Tatars website editor and Tamırlar project editor; Oksana Dovgopolova, D. Sc. Philosophy, professor at the Kyiv School of Economy, and curator at the Past / Future / Art memory culture platform
(UN)KNOWN KHERSON: CULTURE AND MEMORY IN (DE)OCCUPIED TERRITORIES
March 23, 2025
4:00 pm
Odesa National Fine Arts Museum
5a Sofiivska St., Odesa
Speakers: Oleksandr Knyha, Yuliia Manukian, and Serhii Diachenko
Moderator: Oksana Dovgopolova
The shock of how quickly Kherson Oblast was occupied in 2022—and subsequently liberated in November of the same year—revealed to Ukrainians many new things about themselves. Pro-Ukrainian meetings in defiance of Russians’ armed threats, reliance on survival strategies, and forced collaboration with the enemy became a new reality. It may seem that culture cannot exist in a situation where people have to live under constant threat to their lives. But is that really so? The Kherson occupation period provides many facts to demonstrate the meaning of culture for Ukrainian society and Russian occupiers. Let’s reflect on this experience and preserve it.
Oleksandr Knyha, General Director of Mykola Kulish Kherson Regional Academic Music and Drama Theater; Yulia Manukian, the Founder of Urban Re-Public NGO and curator of art and urban projects; Serhii Diachenko, museum specialist, local history expert, and architect; Oksana Dovgopolova, D. Sc. Philosophy, professor at Kyiv School of Economy, and curator of the Past / Future / Art memory culture platform
VIDEO
PHOTO
The Unseen Force discussion program held in the Odesa National Fine Arts Museum on March 14 and 23, 2025
Photos by Ivan Strakhov
ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
Unseen Force presents reflections of Ukrainian artists on the occupation and the struggle for freedom, stories about political prisoners of the Kremlin, non-violent resistance movements (“The Yellow Ribbon”, “Angry Mavka”) and humor, which often helped to survive the most difficult moments.
Exhibition curator — Olha Mukha, NGO “UAC-Lviv”
Curator of the women’s artistic resistance section — Tetyana Filevska, Ukrainian Institute