Miro Schawalder
Kyiv, Ukraine
June 1-30, 2019
Miro Schawalder works as an artist and filmmaker. He studied fine arts at the F+F School for Art and Design Zurich and Art & Film at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. In his work he explores imaging techniques, documentary conventions and representations of history in its spatial dimensions. His projects have been presented at international biennials, festivals and in exhibitions.
During his residency with a team Schawalder worked on a research project on forced labour during Nazism alongside the River Rhine (on the border between Austria and Switzerland). In Kyiv he aimed to learn about a Ukrainian perspective on forced labour and how the experience of forced labour has been narrated to following generations.
Audio walk on forced labor, flood protection and escape became a result of this research Border crossings on the flood plains of the River Rhine (Website only in German)
Events in the frame of the residence
June 27, Walk in the city Former places of forced labour in Kyiv (1941-1943 German occupation)
During the tour participants visited three sites that are connected to forced labour during the Nazi occupation (1941-1943) in Kyiv. The historian Tetiana Pastushenko told about the system of labour recruitment and deportations to Germany. Afterwards, the artist Miro Schawalder described the conditions of forced labour in western Austria and contemporary politics of commemoration.
The first site was the Academy of Visual Arts and Architecture (Smirnova-Lastochkina Street 20), where the German Labour Office was located during the occupation. Here, the population of Kyiv had to register regularly and the citizens were assigned to work for the German war economy.
The next stop was a backyard where there used to be a transit camp (Sichovykh Striltsiv Street 24). From there the forced labourers had to walk to the train station, where they were deported to the German Reich.
The last site was a school (Nekrasovska Street 4). From 1941 to 1943 the school building was used by the recruitment commission for women who were deported to Germany to work in households and on farms.
The tour symbolically ended with a walk to the railway station, from where the forced laborers were deported to Germany.
The residency of Miro Schawalder in Kyiv was a part of the CENTRAL & EAST EUROPE CALLING. an Artist-in-Residence Exchange Program.
The partner institution of the program in Ukraine and the hosting organisation was Open Place.