22 January 2025, 6.00 pm - 8.00 pm | Universität des Saarlandes, Innovation Center A2 1, Seminarraum 3.05.1
Fiona Greenland: Ukrainian cultural heritage in wartime: Political and institutional challenges of restitution and reparation Since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, Ukraine’s cultural heritage assets have sustained significant damage through bombardment, looting, and deliberate atacks by combatants.
The toll includes art museums, theatres, archaeological sites, libraries, monuments, and houses of worship. In response, Ukrainian cultural workers have launched innovative projects to monitor and document the damage and thetis. What started as a real-time documentation effort has developing into a joint effort to plan for post-war reparations – including the restitution of stolen artworks and artifacts. This provides a unique opportunity to assess how reparation is planned for and systematized in a context in which there are competing national and international understandings of what constitutes adequate reparations.
The talk is based on the author’s extensive study of wartime cultural heritage losses in Ukraine, interviews with Ukrainian NGOs and government officials, and fieldwork conducted in Ukraine in 2024.
