In Lviv’s Mars Field, bouquets are so fresh and plentiful that bees forage among the clipped cornflowers. Walking through this makeshift war burial ground, an extension of a car park near the city’s Lychakiv Cemetery, I see scores of mourners tending to the graves of their loved ones, surrounded by memorial flags. Their concentrated activity creates separate plots: framed portraits of soldiers, often posed with fervor, stuffed toys for missing parents, potted chrysanthemums mulched to last, sunflowers with well-rooted roots already well developed. The physical remains of each person who died fighting the Russian army have been populated with mementos to make up for their absence.
Even though the cemetery is in public space, I feel my momentary presence is an invasion of privacy. At the adjacent late 18th-century cemetery-cum-museum, I am one of many visitors to a layered historical perspective, but here my presence as an outsider, a bystander to recent loss, feels voyeuristic. Mourners feel no need to take photographs at this living monument, even if I am only recording what seems to be thoughtfulness. So why am I here? Why am I here?
Bounded but parallel
I came to Ukraine for a valid professional reason – to attend the Second Symposium on the Most Documented Wars. Ukrainian recordthe Institute for Human Sciences (IWM) in Vienna, a long-time Eurozine collaborator, and Lviv Center for Urban HistoryIt’s my job to cover Ukraine in the European Dialogueis a focal point established in 2014 and will assume even greater significance from 2022. But my decision to visit was based on more than a sense of obligation or dedication to the subject.
Yes, I participated in the two-day panel discussion and one-day workshop with the hope of gaining a deeper understanding of how national and international organizations develop their evidence-building capacity. Yes, I was a member of the Institute for Documentation and Exchange, an initiative launched byindex), initially from Lviv, to collectivize documentary work on the war. Yes, I wanted to spend quality time with colleagues with whom we produced related texts, often from afar. And yes, I wanted to meet writers who would become my future Eurozine collaborators, especially those who could not leave Ukraine.
But above all, what I wanted to address was the disconnect between bordering yet parallel existences: the difference between the secure lifestyle I experience in the EU and the everyday conflict in Ukraine.
The Fall of the Rebel Angels, Frans Floris, Antwerp, 1554. Image courtesy: Wikimedia Commons
Europe is at war, but you’d never know it from the way everything seems to be going smoothly across Ukraine’s western border. Am I here to make what seems abstract a reality?
Coexisting dichotomies
The phenomenon of what seems vague from afar becoming more concrete up close was certainly helped by crossing the Polish border, but was still mitigated.
Though Lviv is far from the front lines of the fighting and one of the country’s least affected urban centres in the west, the shadow of war is palpable, but only because the way daily life is adapting to the chaos is so clear. During the symposium, held in a basement for safety reasons, there were periodic power cuts, halting the meeting until a backup could be activated. Petrol fumes from many other generators littered the shop-lined sidewalks. Sirens sounded in the middle of the night warning of possible air raids. A young woman in khaki drove an Uber from the battlefields of Mars.
Lviv is a city of ornate but dated architecture that hasn’t yet been inhabited by oligarchs or foreign investors, but otherwise resembles its European sister cities built during the past expansion of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Its vibrant cultural scene surpasses that of other cities of its size, and its international residents, from the struggling to eke out a living to the outwardly wealthy, live out a hustle and bustle of urban life.
Informal conversations with symposium participants revealed that the dichotomy between the perception of the ongoing war in the East and the relative safety of life in Lviv coexists here too. Not knowing how to reconcile different realities during wartime seems like a common experience. But the example of finding the right approach to bridge the gap is clearly different for Ukrainians trying to contact surviving relatives who served in the war. But the wait is bearable when there is security in knowing that the conversation will eventually take place.
Chain effect
The symposium will address a wide range of issues related to the complexities of recording and documenting war, including dealing with intense emotions, recognizing the physical nature of places and bodies during war, developing appropriate data collection methods, foreseeing a sustainable recording process, understanding legal constraints, and rethinking Ukraine’s relationship with Western institutions.
In the final panel discussion, the speakers were asked to share their views on how solidarity has changed since 2022. For Angelina Karyakina, journalist and co-founder of the Public Interest Journalism Lab, the first wave response, which helped build personal and organizational national solidarity, has led to a return to pre-emergency political divisions between Ukraine’s various actors. And Volodymyr Sheiko, director of the Institute of Ukrainian Studies, spoke of the need for a more concrete and unified approach, saying that “solidarity is not an act of charity” and that “it requires active participation.”
I focus on reaching out to those working on projects related to environmental restoration. Sociologist Darina Pirogova shares information about the 30% Manifesto, a project organized in collaboration with Daria Borovik, Nina Dilenko and Vadim Sidash that raises questions about the future of Ukraine’s post-war natural spaces. Exhibited in the Ukrainian Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale in 2023, the group is currently producing video interviews with key actors discussing the possibility of turning war-ravaged farmland, burnt forest areas, polluted rivers and coastlines into designated areas of natural habitat. This is one-third of Ukraine’s land area needed to meet the EU Biodiversity Strategy’s rewilding quota by 2030.
Writer and curator Dmytro Chepurnyi, co-founder of the Ukrainian Environmental Humanities Network (UEHN), spoke about the Ukrainian Ecology artist-in-residence program he co-directs with IZOLYATSIA. “Diverse environments, their multifarious relationships and languages of expression are at stake,” the organizers write. Artists and environmental experts work together on projects aimed at protecting Ukraine’s natural habitats or revealing the impact of war on the environment, the results of which will be published in cultural magazines. Solomiya.
Climate expert Anastasia Ivashina said: Eco Actionshared a graph showing the percentage of carbon dioxide emissions that occurred during the first 24 months after the full Russian invasion: 175 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions, “more than the annual emissions of a highly industrialized country like the Netherlands.” 29% were due to the war, reconstruction is now at the same level at 32%, civil aviation rerouted to avoid Ukrainian and Russian airspace accounted for 14%, forest fires accounted for 13%, energy infrastructure accounted for 10%, and relocation of communities accounted for 2%.
The data visualization chart shows that the effects of war are not limited to the sites of bombing and fighting. We know that the effects of war are not isolated events, but it doesn’t hurt to remember that every act of violence has a cascading effect.
Similarly, I will come away from this symposium aware that there are many valid means of documenting this war. There will naturally be people motivated to collect documents that may later be admitted as evidence in a court of law. But the breadth of skills on offer and the variety of avenues for gaining knowledge suggests the potential for using artistic and scientific means to effectively communicate the impact of war crimes.
Toxicity as Ouroboros
A prime example is the work of Irina Zamluieva, an artist and cultural geographer who looks at the interconnectedness and impacts of the weaponization of pesticide production. Following news reports of mass honeybee deaths near rapeseed fields in Ukraine that had been sprayed with neonicotinoids, Zamluieva’s essay develops a complex series of arguments that place responsibility not only on biological destruction but also on chemical warfare.
Scanning those bright yellow swaths that grow year after year in the Ukrainian countryside, Zamluiyeva uncovers practices that are far from sanguine. Referring to well-documented reports of chemical manufacturers “cross-trading” toxic products, she identifies a deadly exchange between different “sectors.” “Technology, understood as a means of conquest…transforms the production of different kinds of violence. Synthetic chemicals developed for war, to achieve objectives on the battlefield, are used in agriculture as synthetic productivity enhancers, and then revert back to mysterious war technologies.”
Globalised agrochemical giants, authoritarian regimes and international organisations are portrayed as the archetypal perpetrators. In Europe, the toxicity of pesticides to pollinators, other organisms and ourselves is well known, but much less is known about the export of chemicals banned by the EU. Zamluiyeva recognises that ringfencing one sector, one country or one region is not enough: “As long as producers make and sell toxic substances, capital-generating loopholes will allow them to continue making profits at the expense of ‘non-target’ life and vitality elsewhere.”
And sooner or later, this evil deed is bound to have negative consequences: “Large quantities of pesticides banned in the EU are regularly found in traces of imported food and industrial crops,” Zamluiyeva reflects. “Toxicity is an ouroboros. ‘None of us are free until we are all free’ is not just a political slogan, it’s a fact.” If only all forms of toxicity were recognized as the violent, self-destructive act that they are.
Why here?
As Irina Zamluieva, I feel the importance of place. In the Fields of Mars in Lviv, the question I asked myself was not “Why am I here?” but “Why am I here?”
Driving towards the border, I caught a fleeting glimpse of flags fluttering by the roadside. Passing a small town and emerging from the trees, I soon spotted another Martian field. This time from the taxi it looked like an actual field, but it was even less war-like, physically some distance from the scene of conflict, even peaceful. But in this case, this unremarkable spot reminded me of the many fields that are no longer recognizable as they once were. The soldiers buried there, most likely, died there. It was a stark reminder that duality has a grim reality if we look closely; and that the lands and places between “here” and “there” are more connected than they might seem at first glance.
The “Most Documented Wars” symposium, held in Lviv, Ukraine from June 30 to July 2, 2024, Lviv Urban History Center and Ukrainian recordInstitute for Human Sciences Vienna (IWM).
