Open Place / Activities / Residency / The residencys’ projects / Strong Together

Strong Together

A residency program for artists from Ukraine who work with socially engaged practices, co-organized by Open Place and Arsenal Gallery in Bialystok.


Platform for interdisciplinary practice Open Place and Arsenal Gallery in Białystok joined forces to launch a comprehensive program of events called Strong Together. Combining residency and educational formats, the program involved artists from Ukraine, Ukrainian refugees in Białystok, and residents of Białystok. The aim of the program was to provide broad access to educational and artistic processes, create a safe space for interaction and integration, and challenge the traditional roles of guest and host, refugee and citizen.

The Strong Together program aimed to:

Enable Ukrainian artists to continue their artistic practice within the residency program. Offer refugees from Ukraine a variety of cultural and educational activities based on the practices of Ukrainian artists-in-residence. Provide a platform for multicultural and interdisciplinary integration activities.

Test various approaches to cooperation with refugees from Ukraine based on the diverse practices of the artists invited to the residency.

Build trust-based relationships between migrants and cultural institutions while engaging new audiences (Ukrainian artists and the Ukrainian community in Białystok).

The artists were expected to hold workshops and public presentations of their artistic practices. Forty-five artists who applied for the program were eligible to participate. The six artists who received the highest number of votes from the jury took part in the Strong Together residencies.

Artists

Bozhena Kushnir
march-april 2024
lives and works in Lviv and Wroclaw 50/50. She graduated in 2017 from the Lviv National Academy of Arts (Ukraine) with a Master of Interior Design. Artist explores and reflects on events and emotions and the theme of feminism through painting, graphic design, and collage.
Iren Moroz
march-april 2024
a documentary photographer, film director, artist, and writer. She graduated from the Kyiv National University of Technologies and Design (KNUTD) in Kyiv, Ukraine in 2007. In her artistic practice, she focuses mainly on exploring the relationship between human rights and crisis in societies undergoing transition. She has lived in Poland since 2022.
Natalia Kurnosova
april-may 2024
born in Dnipro, is a Kyiv-based artist who graduated from the National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture in 2021. In her work, Kurnosova explores war and ethnic themes through oil painting, paper cutouts, and mixed media.
Viktoria Teletien
may-july 2024
In 2012, she graduated from the Kharkiv State Academy of Design and Arts with a specialization in monumental painting. Her work—paintings, prints, and objects—is about rediscovering the meaning of things that have lost their original functions. She is also concerned with identity, security, and ecology topics.
Eva Alvor
may-june 2024
artist and designer, currently lives and works in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine. In 2006 she graduated with honors from Khmelnytskyi National University, Faculty of Design. Creates works in the genre of contemporary painting and graphics
Yevsieviia Ziakina
june 2024
received a curatorial education from Kharkiv National University. She works with authentic movement, playback performance, animation, and text. She has implemented several curatorial projects and systematically organizes movement and theater practice workshops. Lives and works in Kharkiv.

Activities

«Strong Together»

Partners

“Culture Helps / Культура допомагає” is a project co-funded by the European Union under a dedicated call for proposals to support Ukrainian displaced people and the Ukrainian Cultural and Creative Sectors. The project is a cooperation between Insha Osvita (UA) and zusa (DE).

Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor EACEA can be held responsible for them.