Vasyl Kmet’s lecture “The Library: On Meaning, Accessibility and Resilience”
24 July at 17:00 at Sensoteca (22 Ulas Samchuk Street)

The lecture explored the library as a space of meaning, support, openness, and resilience — especially in challenging times. How are libraries transforming and responding to new challenges while remaining a source of strength for their communities? How can culture and knowledge be made accessible to everyone?

Vasyl Kmet is the director of the Lviv Municipal Library, a medieval historian, archivist, PhD in History, educator, specialist in books and librarianship, author of more than 100 academic articles, and an ambassador for Ukrainian libraries abroad.

Reading of Mykhailo Fatieiev’s play “Alone Together”
24 July at 18:00 in the City Hall Courtyard

Mykhailo Fatieiev (Mike) is a serviceman of the 103rd Brigade of the Territorial Defence Forces named after Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytskyi. He is also a former dispatcher for road and rail transport at the Dnipro-Bug Commercial Seaport and an abstract artist.

About the play:

The experience of the unconquered, trials, and the endless path of rehabilitation. As well as despair and the love that cannot be avoided…

The reading is directed by Oleh Oneshchak.

Zirka Savka’s performance “A Turn of Fate”, featuring Valentyn Oleksiienko
24 July at 19:00 in the City Hall Courtyard

A performance featuring Valentyn Oleksiienko, a veteran who is currently undergoing rehabilitation at the Unbroken Center.

Myroslava Dzis’s lecture “Healing and Trauma Through Art”
25 July at 18:00 at the Lviv Municipal Art Center (11 Stefanyka Street)

Myroslava Dzis is a PhD, psychiatrist, psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapist, sexologist, and lecturer.

About the event:

Art can provide resources for recovery, but it can also activate traumatic experiences. Through images and metaphor, people can safely express their emotions and fears and process them using accessible creative means. Art can allow us to engage with painful memories without confronting them directly — much like children, who may find it easier to represent traumatic events through creative processes than to talk about them.

In other cases, however, someone else’s expression and processing of trauma can trigger traumatic responses in the viewer and lead to a recurrence of symptoms or secondary stress. So why can something that helps one person heal their pain cause another person to relive theirs?

Reading of Andrii Hryhoriev’s play “Lviv 3000”
26 July at 13:00 at Lesia Ukrainka Theatre (36 Horodotska Street)

Andrii Hryhoriev (Queen) is a serviceman of the 100th Separate Mechanized Brigade, a former tax officer from Volyn, and a fan of the band Queen.

About the play:

A futuristic theatrical novella featuring beloved super- and not-so-superheroes travelling through the Lviv metro and searching for ways to escape reality. The ultimate way out, as always, reveals itself at the end, when everything happens for real behind half-closed eyelids.

The reading is directed by Vladyslav Bilonenko.

Reading of Volodymyr Zavhorodnii’s play “Panther”
27 July at 18:00 at the Unbroken Rehabilitation Center (25 Mazepy Street)

Volodymyr Zavhorodnii (Master) is a serviceman of the 20th Separate Rifle Battalion. He fought in the Kursk region. He is married and has two children and a granddaughter.

About the play:

His entire life is shaped by the experience of war: a family of Second World War veterans, service in the Soviet army, Afghanistan, conflicts far from his homeland, the beginning of the full-scale invasion, and a deeply personal choice. Against this backdrop are life, youth, his native village, a girl named Oksana, and one summer evening they spend together… A missile attack, looters and saboteurs, a woman encountered by chance in besieged Chernihiv… And a great dream of love against all odds.

The reading is directed by Svitlana Fedieshova.

Performance “A Traveller’s Playlist”
27 July at 18:00 at Lesia Ukrainka Theatre, Small Stage (36 Horodotska Street)

The performance was inspired by a serviceman with the call sign Adler, who came to Lesia Ukrainka Theatre while undergoing rehabilitation in Lviv to share his story.

Adler was born in Crimea and actively participated in the Revolution of Dignity. In 2014, he joined the Armed Forces of Ukraine and took part in combat operations near Mariupol, in the Sartana area, and at Azovstal, before being taken prisoner. A year ago, he returned to Ukraine following a prisoner exchange.

The performance is largely based on the serviceman’s documentary accounts, which playwright and director Anastasiia Kosodii recorded and shaped into a play. The production also incorporates the personal stories of the actors involved. It was important for Anastasiia to include their voices, as most of them visit wounded soldiers in hospitals every week and also have service members in their families.

As the performance is titled A Traveller’s Playlist, its soundtrack brings together a range of genres, including blues, hip-hop, and trip-hop. The songs are organically woven into the story and reflect different stages of the protagonist’s life. The audience will hear songs about Crimea, Adler’s homeland, as well as Kharkiv and his experience at Azovstal.

A Traveller’s Playlist is a performance that amplifies the voice of Adler, a serviceman who one day decided to tell the story of his life. The production does not seek to rewrite or reinterpret his story in any way. It exists to amplify Adler’s voice — so that it can be heard by everyone.

Director and playwright: Anastasiia Kosodii
Set and costume designer: Tereza Barabash
Songwriters: Yurii Hurzhy, Hryhorii Semenchuk

Cast:

The Woman Who Was Lucky — Taisiia Malakhova
The Man Who Wants to Help — Rostyslav Kolachnyk
The Man Who Has It All Figured Out — Mykhailo Ponzel
The Woman on the Edge — Anastasiia Perets
The Woman Waiting — Tetiana Shelelio

Running time: 1 hour 50 minutes, no interval.

Please note: The performance includes a scene that takes place in complete darkness; scenes depicting violence and brutality; a scene with a lit cigarette; and scenes involving artificial smoke. Please take this into consideration if you are pregnant or have respiratory conditions or allergies. The performance also contains profanity and loud sounds.