This Cat Was Drawn During the War
The public programme brings together panel discussions and conversations that reflect on wars as an ongoing condition shaping Europe’s cultural, political and personal landscape. Since experiences differ, what do we have in common and what connects us today?
Moving beyond linear historical narratives, the programme examines how the legacy of the Second World War, socialism, post-socialist transformations and ongoing conflicts continues to shape memory, everyday experience and artistic practices, and how all these experiences influence our present. Art, culture and literature are viewed here as critical tools that reveal recurring historical crises and may warn against new tragedies.
The programme focuses on testimony, evidence and the ethics of representation, while also exposing the fragile boundary between testimony of violence offered by societies entangled in conflict and the exploitation of such testimony by societies that impose violence and generate war.
This series of conversations highlights the importance of the individual while firmly proposing collective solutions such as solidarity, care and various forms of support.
- Public Programme Curator
- Kateryna Iakovlenko
21 March
12:30
Europe after 1945: Art, Memory and Historical Continuities
The panel is devoted to post-1945 Europe, understood not as a closed chapter of history but as a space of unresolved traumas and uneven memories manifested through art. Bringing together perspectives from the Baltic region and Central and Eastern Europe, the discussion explores how different historical experiences — the Second World War, socialism, post-socialist transformations and contemporary wars — shape a fragmented yet interconnected European memory landscape. And if the post-war period is still ongoing, where does the war actually end, and what role does art play in these processes: can it protect, preserve memory or warn against future crises?
- Participants:
- Valentinas Klimašauskas — curator, writer and Director of the Contemporary Art Centre in Vilnius since January 2025.
- Tomáš Pospiszyl — art historian, educator, writer and curator based in Prague.Since May 2025, he has served as the rector of the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague.
- Zdenka Badovinac — curator and art critic, Director of Moderna Galerija (Museum of Modern Art) in Ljubljana since 1993.
- András Edit — art historian, critic and curator working in Budapest and on Long Island.
- Moderator:
- Kateryna Iakovlenko — curator, visual culture researcher and writer from Ukraine.
22 March
12:30
Why Do Justice and Testimony Require Evidence? Culture as Resistance and the Problem of Appropriation
The discussion addresses the political instrumentalisation of culture and the growing demand for evidence, verification and confirmation in contexts of war, violence and systemic injustice. The panel considers art, journalism and cultural practices as forms of testimony, especially where legal and political mechanisms fail or remain ineffective.
- Participants:
- Anastasiia Cherednichenko — Chair of the Ukrainian ICOM Committee.
- Damir Šagolj — co-founder of WARM and current Director of the WARM organisation in Sarajevo.
- Johana Kotišová — Assistant Professor in Journalism and Documentary at the University of Amsterdam
- Moderator: Natalie Nougayrede is a French Lviv-based journalist, former editor-in-chief of Le Monde and member of The Guardian's editorial board from 2015 to 2020.
Personal Dimensions of War
16:00
The conversation focuses on war through personal and embodied experience. Drawing on literature, historical research and material culture, participants reflect on the loss of home, language and established ways of life, as well as on the fragile structures of everyday survival.
- Participants:
- Anna Gruver — writer from Donetsk, author of the novel Immovable Property (Donetsk — Kyiv/Kraków).
- Karolina Sulej — doctoral researcher at the Institute of Polish Culture, University of Warsaw, where she works in the Holocaust Memory Research Group; fashion history expert, author and co-author of several books, including Personal Effects: Stories of Clothing in Concentration Camps and Death Camps.
- Moderator:
- Kateryna Iakovlenko — curator, visual culture researcher and writer from Ukraine.
