"Ukraine Two Years after the Maidan Revolution: Lessons for Culture and Society" Kateryna Botanova

Devising a new vision of Ukraine has become something in between a life necessity and a fashionable trend. Behind all such visionary pursuits there is a vital need to reflect on the past – which has provoked and made possible a war in the country; the present – where the society is divided into many camps depending on ideology and values; and the future – in which it will be possible to assuage these divisions and to overcome a sense of alienation and mutual stigmatisation.

A long time ago, as if in another life, before the Maidan Revolution, when Ukraine was naively and dreamily preparing for Yanukovych’s signing of the Association Agreement with the EU, journalists were very interested in what could change (naturally, for the better) in our culture, when Ukraine finally became an Associate Member of the EU. Cultural journalists were no exception – a large portion of the country was waiting for the signature with bated breath, as if for God’s blessing, a sentence for the current powers that be, and a ticket to a bright European future.

The disappointment – also among cultural journalists and activists – was considerable when they found out that there would be no miracle after all, because the agreement, at least in the sphere of culture, turned out to be merely an auxiliary instrument for internal reforms. Admittedly, it does contain as many as four points concerning culture, but none of them, perhaps with the exception of the passage on copyright law, exact any changes, rather only opening up certain possibilities.

Undoubtedly, what matters is the symbolic meaning of the agreement – as a declaration connected with values, as an act of committing to paper an intention to move in the direction of law and order and a new social contract. The document can be seen as a certain framework within which to think about the law and culture management practices, and as a set of experiences that are worth remembering and considering.

Nonetheless, such hopes in the coming of a benevolent higher power that would finally clear up the existing social disorder are an interesting element of the relations between Ukrainian citizens and the state. It is a kind of “magical thinking” grounded in paternalism – uncritical perception of the state as a kind of impersonal, alien construct whose role is to serve its citizens and supply them with a minimum level of wellbeing in exchange for their minimal participation.

Over the last two years – after the Maidan – the Ukrainian cultural milieu has been and still is engaged in actively fighting such magical thinking, with varied success. This kind of thinking has often won – especially when what was at stake was an attempt to see things from a broad perspective, to change the very state system of management, which, in fact, is still Soviet in character. In contrast, zooming in on individual initiatives and projects, and the dynamics of discussions on issues fundamental to Ukrainian culture and society, changes are plain to see.

Paternalism or Neoliberalism?

Over at least the last decade, paternalism in the cultural sphere in Ukraine has manifested itself in the fact that employees in the public sector have been prepared to work for pennies, as long as the money continued to come regularly from above. At the same time, they have constantly expected “the state” to somehow improve their lot, while secretly despising it. On the other hand, the private sector has actively, and sometimes even aggressively, steered clear of “the state”, in every possible way contrasting it with itself as the only source of innovation and true cultural processes. And yet, in the same way, it has also counted on support and guardianship from “the state”, while feeling the same contempt for it.

It seemed that the Maidan was supposed to be a strong vaccine against paternalism – against this anonymous, faceless “state” – and transform this insatiable corrupted monster (from which, despite all the scorn, help was still expected) into a community of people who had a voice, who shared democratic values and understood the role of state institutions, as well as the necessity of controlling and influencing them.

Meanwhile, immediately in the first days after the Maidan, next to the processes of self-organisation in the cultural sphere (an example of which is the creation of the Assembly for Culture in Ukraine – a grassroots movement which occupied the basements of the Ministry of Culture for several months), as well as attempts to add culture to the current agenda as a major factor contributing to social change and communication in the – not yet strongly divided – country, also present was a phenomenon that we could probably call a “virus” immune to the vaccine.
The most repeated phrase in the main Ukrainian “press agency”, that is Facebook, was now “down with the Ministry of Culture”. The majority of commentators – ranging from former MPs and well-known artists or directors to average Facebook users whose profiles do not testify to particularly intense activity in the cultural sphere – proposed and still continue to propose that the Ministry of Culture be done away with / closed down / dispersed / abolished. Thanks to the leaders of the public opinion this virtual war of attrition with the main state institution responsible for culture has spilled beyond internet social networks and reached the media, where the Ministry of Culture is recurrently compared to a cemetery, defined as an heir to totalitarian functions of control, and, last but not least, called that Carthage that must be destroyed for the cultural sphere to blossom.

While comparable crushing criticism has been levelled by the media, experts, and society on the whole against practically every other state body, not a single proposal has been expressed to abolish, for instance, the Ministry of Education and Science or the Ministry of Defence. At any rate, such ideas have not been propagated and have not gained the support of a wide range of commentators.

Therefore, what lies behind such a radical stance towards the Ukrainian Ministry of Culture, and why are reforms mentioned much more rarely than calls for abolishment? It appears that among the employees and activists in the cultural sphere a dangerous symptom can be detected: a symptom of exhaustion by a condition which, in fact, they have endured since the early 1990s – no money, no possibility of influencing the authorities, no chance for a larger social support, in a situation where culture has, in effect, been reduced to the level of simple amusement and concerts. It is a kind of condition of systematic neglect, where every step forward – either an establishment of an institution and its maintenance, or an organisation of another exhibition or show – is a heroic step that requires such a number of obstacles and complications to be overcome that often the very fact of undertaking that step becomes more important than its point or quality.

It is a situation in which the cultural sphere in its active part, that is with the exception of the majority of state institutions, has become so accustomed to functioning without the state that it is fully convinced that it can do without it, that the slogan of one recent action by cultural activists – “No – to ministries with no culture. Yes – to culture without ministries” – is not only desirable, but even possible. And what is more, the other side, the public sector, display a somewhat infantile dependence on the protection and support from this total state; and when the support is withdrawn cultural activists are ready to tear down to the ground the embodiment of this state – the Ministry of Culture, without which they have existed all these years, and whose absence in their lives they incessantly declare.

What does this really mean? It means that Ukraine’s cultural community still perceives the state as a normative institution, a protector and a safeguard (which is proved in particular by the lack of critique of the propaganda state policy, acceptance by various cultural circles of the ban on popularisation of Russian cultural production and incessant need for support). Despite all the changes that have taken place over the last year the state still looms as a separate impersonal being with which at best a consumer relationship may be established, a kind of barter – money for scorn.

When it turns out that also after the Maidan the state in general and the Ministry of Culture in particular have failed to clearly change, the logic of insult sets in: “since it did not and does not help me, it means that it is unnecessary altogether”. And then another basic question remains unanswered – what next? What will happen if the state institution managing culture has disappeared?

In the short term, nothing would change for the private sector, while for the public sector this would mean at best burdening the local budgets with financing all the national institutions (theatres and museums) – in other words the sector’s collapse: local budgets would not be able to sustain all the institutions: their own, local and the big national ones. In turn, this would mean an institutional collapse of the entire cultural sphere.

In the long run, the results of this change would be similar to those of any other deregulation and liberalisation: the cultural sphere would be completely dependent on the whims of the market – the fittest would survive and dominate, that is those most popular, enjoying the greatest demand, those with the richer and more influential sponsor. A similar situation is already noticeable, for instance, in the pharmaceutical industry, where research institutes cater for the needs of their sponsors or owners, pharmaceutical giants, instead of meeting the needs of humanity.

The most important consequence of tearing down the Ministry of Culture, however, would be a complete failure of both lessons learned from the Maidan and the pro-European orientation, about which so much has been written and which inspired such high hopes in the autumn of 2013, but which was barely mentioned in the summer of 2014 (when the Association Agreement was finally signed). This would be the case because the move would mean that on a fundamental level the cultural circles are not able to discern in the state – and to be more precise: in the organs of state power, such as the Ministry of Culture – an instrument for the protection of their own interests, a lobbyist acting at the level of state power and private capital, as well as an institution which imposes fair and transparent principles on all the players and participants of the cultural world – ranging from producers to all citizens, who come into contact with the cultural sphere every day, even if they never notice it.

Social lessons of the Maidan

While on the one hand there is a “war for the state”, on the other hand there is a highly tumultuous development of small and medium, often grassroots, and semi-volunteer-based initiatives, which, however exalted it may sound, carry on the spirit and the energy of the Maidan. Interestingly, both of these sides often engage the same people.

It bears stressing that all these cultural initiatives still exist in a highly inauspicious climate: during an economic crisis in the country; during a war being waged in the east, which requires an enormous emotional, organisational and financial effort (a year and a half after the war began in the eastern part of the country a large portion of expenses and organisation of supplies for the army and for the temporary displaced persons is provided by volunteers); when access not only to the public (budgetary), but also any other financing is not available – today there is no fund in the country able to support projects from the cultural sphere, while applying for European funds is rather complicated.

If we take all this into consideration, it is no small surprise that vivid and active culture, not noticed by the state and parallel to it, is, in fact, developing – and with such some intensity. Its main branches could be called “self-organisation” and “education”, although the two often meet and combine.

Self-organisation, mutual trust and support are perhaps the most important lessons that Ukrainian society has learned from the Maidan. Still during the revolution the two first civic media projects were put together: Civic Television (Hromadske.TV) and Civic Radio (Hromadske Radio). Over the last two years the two projects have acquired a largely institutional shape and developed; however, they have remained models for grassroots organisations and a “DIY” attitude.

Others have followed – in both the real and the virtual space. In Kyiv alone over ten new creative spaces, hubs and centres have been created, and they have a fairly busy cultural programme – including exhibitions, literary soirées, concerts, public discussions and popularising initiatives. They are built on the basis of small local investments and try to “squeeze in” in one territory the greatest possible number of various cultural products. However, there are some exceptions on a much larger scale, such as the #reinventvdnh project of renovation and reinvention of the former Soviet Exhibition of Achievements of National Economy, a tiny clone of the Moscow giant: the creation of a university, artistic studios and festival spaces is planned there (in autumn 2015 the biggest Ukrainian festival, Gogolfest, was held on the premises).

In general, the idea of combining various experiences and outlooks, a kind of mutual permeation and stimulation, and in effect, extension of the range of culture from purely artistic practices to experiences of understanding and changing social formations, is gaining ground. This is visible in the creation of ever new platforms and initiatives which propose their own visions of the country’s further development, and within each of them there is a space for intellectuals and artists. Devising a new vision of Ukraine has become something in between a life necessity and a fashionable trend.

Nonetheless, behind all such visionary pursuits there is a vital need to reflect on the past – which has provoked and made possible a war in the country; the present – where the society is divided into many camps depending on ideology and values; and the future – in which it will be possible to assuage these divisions and to overcome a sense of alienation and mutual stigmatisation.

Such a need is also visible in the artistic space: in numerous books on the past which cannot be omitted in artistic projects on complicated nonlinear histories of the present (if we were to include in it the last twenty-five years), which still exist with us and in us, in the theatre and in documentary cinema (one such film, Winter on Fire, has just been included in the Oscar Best Documentary shortlist).

A great challenge now facing artists and intellectuals in Ukraine, similarly to artists in other places and countries that have undergone major turbulences, is to be able to discern the limit which indicates a distance that is sufficient to understand the problem. For the time being, it seems, the limit is still far away; readers and viewers can join in the creation of the chronicle, the living documenting process, which compels us to relive what has not yet been healed.

Is this a need for a constant probing into the social trauma, a kind of adjustment of a wound meant to make it better knit together? Or is it an attempt to meticulously preserve a plurality of histories and memory lines upon which it will later be possible to build communication, understanding and reconciliation? Or is it both?
It is worth noticing that on the one hand this process runs parallel to the wave of aggressive decommunisation, which began during the Maidan with the toppling of the Lenin statue in Kyiv, and then in many other cities, and found its continuation in decommunisation laws, including changes of street names and removal of all visual symbols of the Soviet order, even if they constitute part of monuments and artworks.

On the other hand, such documentary art fits well into the great wave of educational initiatives and is largely included in them – ranging from special popularising projects, for instance reading rooms on various kinds of arts, extension of programmes for children in museums and within inter-museum events promoting self-understanding, as well as understanding of art and the past, to truly countless and diverse initiatives which try, with small, sometimes very small stitches to sew back together the tears between people and parts of the country. The meaning of artists and their projects for this area must not be underestimated.
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One of the most frequently asked questions during various discussions, including those abroad, concerning the changes in Ukraine over the last two years is this: what did Ukrainian culture and the cultural community do for the Maidan and at the Maidan?

The question begs the reverse question – it is vital not to overlook how much the Maidan has given Ukrainian culture and society. It has taught us solidarity; it has taught us not to give up, to trust and not to alienate those who stand near us; to look our own history in the eye, regardless of how unpleasant this may be.

These lessons are often lost in the hustle and bustle of everyday life and in the difficult, vast political transformations taking place. One of the greatest, although expected, disappointments has been that with politicians, most of whom appear to make light of this lesson.

Nonetheless, these lessons are still present in the cultural field, which now is simultaneously a field of action as well as a field of memory, reflection and reconciliation. This should be remembered by those who like to question out loud how anyone can think about culture when people are dying nearby and every day.

Translated from the Polish by Ewa Kowal

Kateryna Botanova – cultural critic, curator, and cultural producer. She is a chief editor of cultural page on Ukrainian Pravda – largest online information and news platform in Ukraine. Since 2014 she’s a co-curator of CULTURESCAPES international festival, Basel, Switzerland. Since March 2014 she is a part of Platform for Strategic Initiatives Culture-2025 that is developing long-term strategy for reforms in culture for Ukraine. She lectures on contemporary art, cultural management and cultural criticism.