The responsibility to be: cultural practices of healing, imagination, and presence

The closing panel of the Arts for Health Congress explored cultural policy, Lviv’s bid to become a European Capital of Culture, and, ultimately, the role of the arts in restoring wholeness, imagination, and a sense of presence.

Speakers:

• Yuliia Khomchyn, Director of the Institute for Cultural Strategy.
• Andrii Linyk, Director of Lviv Radio.
• Grigory Semenchuk, poet, musician, cultural practitioner, and Head of the Dialogue Arts Council.
• Ihor Kolesnyk, cultural studies scholar and founder of the Laboratory of Secular Meditation.

Moderator:

Bohdan Shumylovych, historian, art historian, researcher, and Associate Professor in the Department of Cultural Studies at the Ukrainian Catholic University.

The Arts and Health Congress is part of Healing Arts Ukraine — an arts and health campaign to support military health, veteran recovery and civilian resilience in times of conflict.

Healing Arts Ukraine was spearheaded by Art Therapy Force as part of the Jameel Arts & Health Lab’s global Healing Arts initiative. The campaign was supported by the WHO Regional Office for Europe through the EU-funded Health Resilience in the Eastern Partnership Programme and co-produced by a national coalition of organisations working at the intersection of culture, healthcare, education, and policy, including the Lviv City Council, LME ‘Lviv radio’, the Institute for Cultural Strategy, the UNBROKEN Rehabilitation Centre, and King’s College London.