How UNESCO Supports Exiled Ukrainian Women Artists

Paris, 9 June 2022 – UNESCO is launching a scheme to support Ukrainian women artists who have had to flee their country because of the war, in partnership with the NGO Perpetuum Mobile. It will enable them and their children to be hosted and cared for by a cultural institution in the country where they have found refuge.

“The war has driven millions of Ukrainians into exile, the vast majority of whom are women and children. Among these people, women artists who have been forced to suspend their creative activities often lack material and financial resources to resume their work in their host country,” says Audrey Azoulay, UNESCO’s Director-General.

For this reason, UNESCO decided to launch a programme dedicated to Ukrainian women artists in exile, born of a partnership with the NGO Perpetuum Mobile, initiator of the Artists at Risk platform, which brings together cultural institutions in over 15 countries.

Audrey Azoulay

The artists concerned will be supported for a minimum of three months by a cultural institution in their host country.

They will be taken care of with their children in artistic residencies, and will benefit from support in terms of networking, visibility and the conception of new cultural projects.

(Left) Ukraine electro-pop duo Bloom Twins: “It has really affected us,” said singer Anna Kuprienko. “We’re talking to our family, we have a lot of friends and our second manager living there. We go back to the Ukraine quite a lot. We were only there two months ago. We were hopeful that this situation with Russia wouldn’t go where it has and that it would resolve.” (Right) Ukraine singer Khrystyna Soloviy : “We are a generation that has never seen the Soviet Union and was born in a free Ukraine. Ukrainians are not Russians, as said by the Russian government. We have a difficult, depressed history of Russian colonisation.”

The scheme will aim to provide them with the means to become autonomous by the end of their hosting period, whether they then choose to return to live in Ukraine or to settle permanently in their host country. UNESCO has already set aside $140,000 usd (about $177,000 cad at time of this publication) to finance the scheme, which should initially benefit some 30 artists and their children.

A new link in UNESCO’s emergency response

The programme complements the range of emergency measures already deployed by UNESCO since the beginning of the war to safeguard tangible and intangible cultural heritage, secure museum collections and combat illicit trafficking in cultural property.

UNESCO partner Freemuse

Moreover, since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, UNESCO has been monitoring the situation of artists in close consultation with artists’ networks and cultural actors in the country. This work is also carried out in coordination with international organizations involved in supporting artists at risk: PEN America’s Artists at Risk Connection, Perpetuum Mobile/Artists at Risk, ICORN, Freemuse, Prince Claus Fund and the PAUSE programme. For the Silo, Lucía Iglesias Kuntz, UNESCO Press Service.

Featured image: Face of War (Putin in bullets) co-created by Daria Marchenko, 35 now exiled Ukraine woman artist.

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One response to “How UNESCO Supports Exiled Ukrainian Women Artists”

  1. Lucía Iglesias Kuntz Avatar
    Lucía Iglesias Kuntz

    UPDATE— Ukraine: UNESCO launches programme to support Ukrainian artists

    Paris, 14 June 2022 – UNESCO will provide financial support to Ukrainian artists to support the continuation of artistic creation and access to cultural life, under a pilot programme launched by the Organization in partnership with the Ukrainian NGO Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA).

    The war in Ukraine has led to the sudden suspension of usual cultural life in Ukraine: Most artists lost their revenue stream, while art collections are threatened. This situation seriously impacts cultural diversity, which is promoted by the 2005 UNESCO Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions.

    “The protection and promotion of artists and cultural professionals is a core mission of UNESCO, with increased urgency in the context of armed conflict. Through their talent and creativity, artists have the power to maintain dialogue and social ties in the most difficult times. They help lay the ground for reconstruction of societies,” says Audrey Azoulay, Director-General of UNESCO.

    Grants for art projects

    In response to this situation, UNESCO is launching a pilot programme “supporting the continuation of artistic creation and access to cultural life in Ukraine” in partnership with MOCA NGO, the lead institution of the Ukrainian Emergency Art Fund (created in partnership with Zaborona media, The Naked Room and Mystetskyi Arsenal museum complex). Already endowed with $100,000 by UNESCO, it will provide grants to artists to support their creative work and ensure that the population continues to have access to culture.

    UNESCO and MOCA NGO will place particular emphasis on funding arts projects that contribute to building resilience in populations facing the trauma of war.

    Olga Balashova, Head of NGO Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA NGO) says: ” Our organisation unites representatives of artistic and expert communities working with contemporary art in Ukraine, systematically develops the sphere, and after 24th of February we felt that importance of our mission have only raised, as cultural front: vibrant and alive voices of Ukrainian cultural professionals and artists are crucial element of sharing our values and vision for future.”

    UNESCO steps up its emergency response

    The programme complements the range of emergency measures already deployed by UNESCO since the beginning of the war to safeguard tangible and intangible cultural heritage, secure museum collections and combat illicit trafficking in cultural property.

    Moreover, since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, UNESCO has been monitoring the situation of artists in close consultation with artists’ networks and cultural actors in the country. This work is also carried out in coordination with international organizations involved in supporting artists at risk: PEN America’s Artists at Risk Connection, Artists at Risk (AR)/ Perpetuum Mobile, ICORN, Freemuse, Prince Claus Fund and the PAUSE programme.

    The UNESCO programme supporting the continuation of artistic creation and access to cultural life in Ukraine was supported by the UNESCO Heritage Emergency Fund. We wish to thank its donors: the Qatar Fund for Development, the Government of Canada, the Kingdom of Norway, the French Republic, the Principality of Monaco, ANA Holdings INC., the Republic of Estonia, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the Slovak Republic, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, the Principality of Andorra, and the Republic of Serbia.

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