We invite scholars, researchers, artists, and practitioners to participate in the International Scientific and Practical Conference “Artistic and cultural practices as instruments for the humanitarian understanding of war.”
The event will be streamed via Zoom on 18 June 2026 starting at 11:00 a.m. The access link will be published after 15 June on the websites of the Institute for Cultural Research of the National Academy of Arts of Ukraine and the Modern Art Research Institute of the National Academy of Arts of Ukraine.
Contemporary war, emerging not only as a geopolitical or military phenomenon but also as a profound challenge to the humanities, requires a rethinking of the fundamental categories of culture, art, memory, subjectivity, and identity.
In the context of the radical transformation of sociocultural reality, particular importance is attached to research that integrates cultural studies and art-historical approaches to the analysis of war as a complex symbolic, media, and anthropological process. The conference aims to serve as a platform for the synthesis of interdisciplinary research directions within a unified field of inquiry—the humanitarian understanding of war through artistic and cultural practices.
Special attention will be given to:
– understanding war as a phenomenon of screen culture;
– exploring the image as a tool for cognition and the construction of reality;
– analyzing art as a space for engaging with trauma, memory, and identity;
– identifying anti-colonial strategies within contemporary cultural processes;
– interpreting the Ukrainian experience as part of the global humanitarian discourse.
Participants may contribute to one of the following conference sections:
Section 1. Theory of culture and methodology of war studies
(War as a cultural and symbolic phenomenon; methodologies of humanitarian analysis of war; postcolonial and decolonial approaches; transformation of humanitarian knowledge in wartime.)
Section 2. Screen culture and visual practices of war
(Cinema and war: documentary and artistic dimensions; the screen as a medium for representing traumatic experience; visual strategies of testimony; the image as an interface of cultural reality.)
Section 3. Contemporary art as a form of reflection on war
(Current artistic practices; art and social interaction; artistic strategies for understanding war; art as a form of critical knowledge.)
Section 4. Memory, archive, and cultural trauma
(Politics of memory; art as an archive of war; individual and collective trauma; symbolic practices of remembrance.)
Section 5. Anti-colonial and decolonial strategies
(Deconstruction of imperial narratives; cultural identity in wartime; art as a tool of decolonization; the Ukrainian experience in a global context.)
Section 6. Human beings, the body, and subjectivity in war
(Anthropology of war; embodiment and vulnerability; transformation of the subject; the image of the child in the culture of war.)
Section 7. Digital culture and new media
(Digital practices of representing war; social media as a space of testimony; VR/AR and immersive practices; digital memory.)
Section 8. Art as a humanitarian practice of engagement
(Art therapy and participatory practices; art as a form of communication; cultural diplomacy; international artistic projects.)
The following SPECIAL SCIENTIFIC PANELS are also planned:
– Screen culture in times of war: theoretical challenges
– Methodology of contemporary art research in conditions of crisis
