A residency programme for Ukrainian arts professionals, delivered in partnership with British Council Ukraine, Creative Scotland and the Ukrainian Institute.

In 2023, a unique pilot project welcomed six leaders and decision makers from the Ukrainian arts sector to visit and stay at arts organisations across Scotland. Among those selected to take part in the residencies were cultural manager Veronika Skliarova, writer and translator Ostap Slyvynsky, curator Kateryna Rusetska, graphic artists Kristina Yarosh and Anna Khodkova (EtchingRoom1), and artist Ruslan Luchko.

A bespoke programme was created for each participant, offering them time away from turmoil and a chance to reflect and think to the future for their own artistic practices, their organisations, and the wider art sector in Ukraine. 

The residencies were based in creative organisations across the country, leading in arts, literature, sculpture, and music. The organisations hosting participants for the project were: Cove Park, Moniack Mhor, Hospitalfield, and Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop. 

Each residency was designed to provide valuable time and thinking-space allowing participants to develop their work, take advantage of facilities, workshops, events, and to link-up with Scottish-based creatives to build lasting connections across the creative sector in the UK. Coming from a range of artistic disciplines, participants are leaders in the arts sector in Ukraine having worked in fields including festival creation, visual arts, design, literature, and music. 

The project was born out of a Creative Scotland and British Council partnership and as a key legacy project for the UK/Ukraine Season of Culture’s Future Reimaged programme. The UK/Ukraine Season of Culture was launched by the British Council and the Ukrainian Institute in 2022 to mark 30 years of UK/Ukraine diplomatic relations. Through a year-long programme of activity, the Season has served as a platform for cultural exchange, artistic expression, and cooperation, bringing together a community of artists from Ukraine and the UK.

Hear direct from the residency participants and hosts below: 

Cove Park – Veronika Skliarova

Cove Park is an international artists residency centre on Scotland’s west coast whose residencies support the development of new work by national and international artists, groups and organisations working in all art forms

Veronika Skliarova is a cultural manager, theatre producer, and art curator. She is the programme director of the “Parade-fest” (Kharkiv), producer of “Сrimea, 5am” (intersectoral performative project) and Ukrainian Odyssey (performances in 5 cities of Ukraine). After February 2022, Veronika created Anthology24 – collection and publication of texts for theatre written after the start of the full-scale invasion, and “Art therapy force” – large-scale educational project aimed at reorienting the educational programs of creative universities in Ukraine towards the certification of art therapists and the direct work of artists with Ukrainian children, IDPs, veterans.

 

Hospitalfield – Kateryna Rusetska

An arts centre located in Arbroath, Hospitalfield is dedicated to contemporary art and ideas. 

Kateryna Rusetska is a co-founder and programme curator of the Dnipro Center for Contemporary Culture (DCCC), NGO Kultura Medialna, experimental music and contemporary art festival Construction. She focuses on creating visual, educational programs, community interactions, and projects related to activism.

Moniack Mhor – Ostap Slyvynsky

Moniack Mhor is Scotland’s National Writing Centre, based in the Scottish Highlands.

Ostap Slyvynsky is a Ukrainian poet, translator, essayist and scholar. He authored five books of poetry and “A War Vocabulary”, a documentary book about the Russian aggression against Ukraine. His books have been published in Germany, Poland, Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Slovakia, and Macedonia. Ostap was the first program director of the International Literary Festival in Lviv in 2006–2007. In 2016–2018, he organised the public discussion platform Stories of Otherness (a series of public interviews with writers, intellectualists and civic activists who suffered from different kinds of social exclusion). Since 2021, he has organised the PEN Ukraine’s festival Propysy (The Writings) aimed at novice authors. He was elected the Vice President of PEN Ukraine in 2022.

 

Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop – EtchingRoom1

Located in Newhaven, Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop provides support to artists in different ways, including a year-round programme of residencies.

EtchingRoom1 is the artistic group founded in 2016 by two graphic artists Kristina Yarosh and Anna Khodkova in Kyiv, Ukraine. The artists utilise etching techniques and create mosaics and installations. 

Kristina Yarosh graduated from the Publishing and Printing Institute of the National Technical University of Ukraine “Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute”, from the department of book graphics.

Anna Khodkova graduated from the National Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture in 2016. She works with techniques of etching, linseed, silkscreen, monotypes, and collages.

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