Exhibition "A Journey Through the Ukrainian-Jewish Encounter: From Antiquity to 1939" opens in Kaniv

On 29 September 2025, Kaniv's Culture and Arts Center (Cherkasy Oblast) hosted the opening of the traveling exhibition "A Journey Through the Ukrainian-Jewish Encounter: From Antiquity to 1939," organized by UJE. It was another stop on a grand all-Ukrainian cultural and educational tour dedicated to the history of the coexistence of Ukrainians and Jews over the centuries.

Vladyslav Hrynevych, Jr., UJE's regional manager in Ukraine, addressed the audience, emphasizing that the exhibition's purpose was to showcase the complex and diverse history of Ukrainian-Jewish relations, their cultural mutual influence, and their joint contribution to the development of Ukrainian statehood.

Ryta Lavrentieva, Director of the Kaniv Culture and Arts Center, and administrator Kateryna Bilyk thanked the project organizers for the opportunity to present the exhibition in Kaniv, a town with deep historical and cultural roots.

Svitlana Bryzhytska, Deputy Director General for research at the Shevchenko National Reserve, shared many interesting things about Taras Shevchenko's connection with the Jewish community and how his works and letters drew attention to Jewish lives, images, and motifs, particularly in folk culture.

The honorable guests also included Olena Chervynska, head of Kaniv's Jewish community, Kostiantyn Andriienko, representative of the Kaniv Town Council, and Viktor Peresunko, director of the Svitankova Zoria Cultural and Educational Center. They expressed their support for the project and thanked the organizers for enriching the local cultural life with national-level events.

A special highlight of the event was the speech by Ihor Likhovy, a Ukrainian statesman and public figure, diplomat, museologist, culturologist, and historian of Ukrainian culture, who was Ukraine's Minister of Culture and Tourism (2005–2006) and Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to the Republic of Belarus (2007–2010). He noted that such exhibitions shaped the cultural consciousness of society and were an important step in the development of interethnic dialogue.

Liudmila Sokur, Academic Secretary at the Shevchenko National Reserve, emphasized that a discussion of the unity of cultures and peoples carried special symbolic significance in Kaniv, a town that preserves the spirit of the Ukrainian nation.

The artistic component of the opening ceremony consisted of three brilliant performances. The first to impress the audience was Anastasia Serhiienko, a young actor from the Kaniv children's theater group "Phoenix," who performed an excerpt from The Mirror, a play by the modern Ukrainian playwright Volodymyr Konovalenko. She then recited Serhiy Zhadan's poignant poem "Now I Will Be Your Eyes," which evoked an emotional response from the audience. Finally, Ryta Lavrentieva sang the song "Magic Violin," adding solemnity and warmth to the event and emphasizing its cultural significance.

Founded in 1144, Kaniv is a town with a rich history. It has become a center of national memory for the Ukrainian people as the place where Taras Shevchenko is buried. At the same time, Kaniv has deep historical ties to the Jewish community, which has lived there since the 18th century. The exhibition features bilingual panels that showcase photographs, documents, and maps, recounting over a thousand years of Ukrainian-Jewish coexistence, from the earliest Jewish settlements to World War II. It is designed not only to inform, but also to encourage deeper reflections on the common past, mutual understanding, and tolerance.

Each visitor to the exhibition's opening was presented with a copy of the catalog A Journey Through the Ukrainian-Jewish Encounter: From Antiquity to 1914. This lavishly illustrated 168-page edition was designed to present a coherent narrative and explore the shared historical experience of the two peoples in all its diversity and complexity — both in times of crisis and episodic violence and during extended periods of normal coexistence and multifaceted intercultural interaction.

The event in Kaniv is yet another proof that cultural heritage is not only a memory of the past, but also a basis for future dialogue between peoples.

Vladyslav Hrynevych, Jr., Regional Manager, UJE Ukraine