Artsvit is launching a new educational programme, "Gallery Lab", for young people aged 16 to 21. The project aims to reveal the inner workings of an exhibition and show it as the result of teamwork. Participants will break down the exhibition project into its components and go through all the stages of preparing a group exhibition — from concept development to opening. The exhibition will feature works from the Artsvit Gallery collection.
The programme will allow young people not only to feel part of the process, but also to understand that an exhibition is created through the efforts of many specialists — artists, curators, exhibition architects, designers, communicators, installers, translators, and others. This experience will help them see the exhibition as a collective product, where everyone can find their role and realise their own abilities.
A particular value of the project is the opportunity to work with original works of contemporary Ukrainian art. Participants will get to know the works from the Artsvit collection, in particular graphic series that touch on the themes of industrial landscape, people, and portraits. They will also choose the theme that resonates most today and jointly form a curatorial statement, reflected in their own exhibition.
The programme includes seven theoretical and practical classes and will conclude with a public event — the opening of an exhibition created by young people. The meetings will take place every Saturday at the Artsvit Gallery from 18 October to 6 December at 2 p.m. Each class will last two hours. Participation is free of charge, but prior registration is required.
Please note: the number of participants is limited to 20 people.
Course programme:
• 18 October – Exhibition project: components, preparation stages, team.
• 25 October – Curatorship – what is it? How are connections built?
• 1 November – Introduction to the Art World collection. Preliminary selection of works with its curator Viktoria Nikitina.
• 8 November – Exhibition. The relationship between space, works and curatorial expression.
• 15 November – Exhibition concept, curatorial text.
• 22 November – Accompanying elements of the exhibition: design development, PR strategy, writing a press release.
• 29 November – Exhibition installation, publication of its announcement.
• 6 December – Exhibition opening.
Programme lecturers:
Oleksandra Shovkun – project manager at Artsvit Gallery, curator, cultural studies specialist, author of several educational programmes;
Viktoria Nikitina – curator of the Artsvit Gallery collection.
Design: Andrii Herliuk
Photo: Stanislav Pyvonos
The educational programme for young people, "Gallery Lab", is implemented with the support of the Goethe-Institut in Ukraine, the MC6 Creative Residency and the non-governmental organisation Inshaya Osvita as part of the Cultural Resistance project, which is funded by the Eastern Partnership programme of the Federal Foreign Office of the Federal Republic of Germany.
"Gallery Lab" is a continuation of Artsvit Gallery's programme of work with children and teenagers, which began in 2014. Following the programmes ‘'Artsvit for Kids’ (for children aged 6–13) and ‘'Art in Me’ (for teenagers aged 13–15), the gallery now offers a space for older young people who are interested in contemporary art and want to learn more about gallery processes.
Since 2023, we have implemented two educational programmes for young people aged 14–18 with the support of the Goethe-Institut in Ukraine: ‘About Art Here and Now’ (2023) and ‘Co-creation’ (2024). The first programme consisted of lectures on Ukrainian contemporary art and its institutional system, as well as three workshops where participants were introduced to various artistic techniques. The second focused on practice and dialogue: workshops with experts introduced young people to performance, fabric printing, and working with sound and video. The result was a pop-up exhibition presenting the results — audio work, video art, printed works, and an ‘Art Map of Ukraine’ with a catalogue. It was an example of true teamwork and co-creation.
The new educational course logically continues this path and allows participants to see how an exhibition functions from the inside. It combines theory and practice: visits to the Artsvit collection storage facility and other institutions to analyse exhibitions, as well as teamwork on preparing a group exhibition. Since creating the concept and narrative of an exhibition project is not an easy process, we are expanding the age group from 16 to 21. The programme may be useful for students of art and creative specialities (in particular, the Dnipro Professional Art and Culture College), as well as anyone looking for their own path in the cultural environment of Dnipro and Ukraine.
