The memorial museum in the settlement of Vysoky functions as an active community hub, hosting weekly gatherings for children, teenagers, and families from the surrounding areas and nearby Kharkiv. Participants explore local landscapes, sketch and photograph streets and gardens, and collaboratively construct a large felt map of the settlement to physically mark personal memories and meaningful sites. They record testimonies from long-time residents about everyday life across generations, create original comics and illustrations based on local history, and engage with the creative legacy of Hnat Khotkevych through interactive exhibitions, film screenings, and musical evenings, successfully weaving the historical figure into the contemporary life of the community.
Over the course of the fellowship, we continue developing the Hnat Khotkevych Museum in Vysoky as a place where local history, family memory, and contemporary creativity can meet.
Our work is rooted in the belief that museums are not only spaces for preserving the past but also spaces where communities can gather, exchange stories, and create new connections. Through regular weekly activities with children, young people, and families from Vysoky and nearby Kharkiv, we seek to create opportunities for participants to engage with the cultural landscape that surrounds them.
Many of these activities begin with simple acts of observation and conversation. Together with children, we explore the streets, gardens, and landscapes of Vysoky, drawing, photographing, and interpreting the places that shape everyday life. One ongoing collective project is the creation of a large felt map of Vysoky, through which participants are documenting meaningful locations, personal memories, and stories connected to the settlement.
Another important strand of our work focuses on family histories and oral testimony. Through a series of conversations with local residents, we are collecting memories about everyday life in Vysoky across different generations. These encounters form the basis for a growing archive of local voices and inspire public presentations, small exhibitions, and creative responses developed together with participants.
At the museum, children also meet regularly to experiment with storytelling through comics and illustration. Drawing on local history, literature, and family narratives, they are creating original stories that may eventually form the basis of a children's publication. We are particularly interested in how visual storytelling can help younger generations develop a personal relationship with local heritage and historical figures.
The legacy of Hnat Khotkevych serves as an important point of reference throughout this work. Rather than approaching him solely as a historical figure, we are interested in his connection to Vysoky as a place of everyday life, creativity, and family experience. Through exhibitions, screenings, musical gatherings, and conversations, participants encounter Khotkevych's world alongside the stories of their own families and neighbours.
Throughout the fellowship, we hope to strengthen the museum's role as a community space where memory is not only preserved but actively shared and reinterpreted. By bringing together children's creativity, oral histories, local landscapes, and family stories, this work seeks to nurture a sense of belonging and encourage younger generations to see themselves as participants in the ongoing story of Vysoky.
