Throughout August, the War Museum hosted a cycle of lectures as part of the parallel program to the exhibition “House of Permanent Exile”. It was organized by the art space “Garage33.Gallery-Shelter” in partnership with international institutions.
Participants at the Museum events joined discussions on themes such as exile, the loss of home, the struggle to preserve cultural identity—particularly through the analysis of the Crimean Tatar people’s experience.
On August 9, the program was opened by journalist and documentarian Nataliia Humeniuk with the lecture “How to Turn Stories into Evidence”. She emphasized the role of journalism in documenting war events and transforming personal stories into a foundation for preserving memory.
On August 11, Alim Aliev delivered the lecture “De/Recolonization: Culture in These Processes”. He focused on the role of art as a tool of decolonization and restoration of cultural memory in the context of Crimea. Alim highlighted the Soviet colonial legacy and how Russia is recolonizing Crimea under occupation. He stressed that the restoration of authentic and historical toponymy will be another task after Ukraine regains control over Crimea.
Historian Martin-Oleksandr Kyslyi gave a lecture on August 13 titled “Crimea as a Battlefield for Homeland: Colonization, Exile, and Return”, in which he traced the key events of the 20th–21st centuries and their impact on Crimean Tatar identity.
On August 15, literary scholar Oleksandra Visych presented the lecture “The Crimean Palimpsest: Literature Against Oblivion”. She explained how literature becomes a space of memory and resists cultural erasure. Special attention was given to the image of Crimea in the works of both contemporary writers and authors of the 1920s–1930s, such as Mykola Cherniavskyi and Ostap Vyshnia.
The program concluded on August 17 with a joint lecture by Milena Khomchenko and Yevheniia Butsykina, “Decolonial Aesthesis: The Creative Potential of Struggle”. The researchers outlined contemporary artistic means of decolonization.
The parallel program to the exhibition “House of Permanent Exile” combined history, culture, and art, opening new opportunities for preserving memory and shaping public dialogue on the cultural heritage of temporarily occupied Crimea.
We are grateful to everyone who joined the cycle of lectures. Together we preserve memory, rethink traumatic experience, and defend the cultural heritage that shapes our identity as a nation.
