Kultura. Exploring Ukraine’s visual culture
Eight-week online course. 23 September – 18 November 2024
What is the role of art and visual culture in shaping and defining identities? How can we ascribe artists and artworks from historical periods and geographies to contemporary nation-states? What is the value of art, especially in the time of war? And can it be weaponised or used as a tool of cultural diplomacy? Within the eight weeks of the Ukrainian Institute London’s inaugural course Kultura, we will delve into all these questions and more.
For far too long, art from Ukraine was absent from the annals of art history, with the country’s visual culture either suppressed or appropriated by the imperial powers that controlled it. Yet creativity flourished and cultural heritage survived to be used by the subsequent generations of Ukrainians to redefine their identity and nationhood. From mosaics of Kyivan Rus’ and Taras Shevchenko’s etchings through the modernist experiments in decorative arts and architecture to the art scene of independent Ukraine, Kultura explores the diversity and endurance of Ukraine’s visual culture, past and present.
Kultura offers a unique opportunity to learn from top experts in visual culture and Ukrainian studies, including leading art scholars from Ukraine.
Comprehensive course handbook and materials. Engaging discussions with lecturers and fellow students. On-demand access to recorded video lectures for flexible learning.
The course is designed with no expectation of prior knowledge of Ukrainian history or art.
In addition to eight online seminars led by top specialists in the field of Ukrainian visual culture, this course offers an exclusive online tour of the acclaimed Royal Academy exhibition In the Eye of the Storm: Modernism in Ukraine, 1900-1930, along with an invitation to the conference Modernism in Ukraine: Local Contexts, Intercultural Encounters, Transnational Exchanges at the Courtauld Institute of Art in London on 4-5 October (please note that it’s an in-person only event, further details are available on the conference webpage).
The course will be held via Zoom.
Course co-curators: Katia Denysova and Constance Uzwyshyn
Course coordinator: Constance Uzwyshyn, Ukrainian Institute London/University of Cambridge
Dates
8 weekly seminars: 23 September – 18 November 2024
18:30 – 20:00 (London Time)
Fees
Full course: £260 general (£180 student) — includes a Certificate of Completion, and full course materials.
One seminar: £35 general (£25 student) — includes course materials and video recording for the seminar attended.
Friends and Benefactors of the Institute are also eligible for a discount. Please check your emails for the checkout code.
Full course: £236 general (£162 student).
One seminar: £31.50 general (£22.50 student).
How to enrol
You can enrol by purchasing tickets to the full course or individual seminars below.
Should you have any queries, please email us at info@ukrainianinstitute.org.uk. We will aim to respond within five working days.
2024 course programme
23 September
‘Disseminator of the light of truth’: Taras Shevchenko and etching in the mid-nineteenth century
Lecturer: Galina Mardilovich (Smart Museum of Art)
Find out more and sign up here.
30 September
From folk to modern in Ukraine’s early 20th-century art
Lecturer: Katia Denysova (University of Tübingen)
Find out more and sign up here.
7 October
Modern architecture and planning in early Soviet Kharkiv
Lecturer: Christina E. Crawford (Emory University)
Find out more and sign up here.
14 October
The expanded Sixties: thinking about post-war Ukrainian Sixties then and now
Lecturer: Lizaveta German (The Naked Room Gallery, Open Archive Research Platform)
Find out more and sign up here.
21 October
Ukrainian contemporary art and feminism: histories within a history
Lecturer: Olena S Dmytryk (Independent Scholar)
Find out more and sign up here.
28 October
Back to the future: how Ukrainian contemporary art reflects the war and its own history
Lecturer: Kateryna Iakovlenko (Cultural Editor-in-Chief of Suspilne Media)
Find out more and sign up here.
4 November
Private online tour of the Royal Academy exhibition ‘In the Eye of the Storm: Modernism in Ukraine, 1900-1930’, and a conversation with Kultura course co-curators Katia Denysova and Constance Uzwyshyn.
Find out more and sign up here.
11 November
Kyiv’s medieval glory: things in heaven and earth
Lecturer: Olenka Z. Pevny (University of Cambridge)
Find out more and sign up here.
18 November
What is the value of art? An exploration of the Ukrainian art market and the impact of the Russian full-scale invasion in Ukraine
Constance Uzwyshyn ( UIL/University of Cambridge)
Find out more and sign up here.
