installation, collage, cardboard and foil, 350 × 75 × 75 cm
sound,10’08”

The project explores the contemporary significance of the anti-war monument. The installation recreates on an enlarged scale the game Jenga while simultaneously referencing the form of the Monument to the Defenders of the Coast at Westerplatte in Gdańsk, designed by Franciszek Duszeńko and Henryk Kitowski. The exterior surfaces of the installation are covered with words, symbols, fragments of landscape, and mirrored elements that merge the viewers’ reflections with the work itself and its surrounding space.

Most of the symbols and expressions of solidarity have been drawn from online comments posted in support of the citizens of Ukraine in their struggle for independence. The phrase “Never Again War” appears most frequently—a slogan that for decades has served in Europe both as a warning and as one of the foundations of collective memory.

A contrast is introduced through recorded conversations between refugees and local residents, heard from within the installation. The participants share their personal experiences, yet both contemporary and inherited traumas become obstacles to mutual understanding. The audio recordings invite viewers to compare how war is perceived by people with experiences of migration and forced displacement living in different European countries.

The logic of the game functions as a metaphor for the fragility of social bonds and the gradual erosion of understanding and empathy towards refugees and migrants in the context of the ongoing Russian-Ukrainian war.

The work was created as part of the Rising. Learning from the Past Today for Tomorrow project, implemented by the Chmura Visual Culture Foundation with financial support from the Foundation for Remembrance, Responsibility and the Future (EVZ Foundation) as part of the ‘Local History’ programme.

The audio element features recordings of statements by individuals with refugee or migration experience from Ukraine. These recordings were made in cooperation with the Gdańsk association ‘Zjednoczeni’.

Participants: Anna Vashchenko, Ihor Romaniuk, Kateryna Jacuszek, Yasya Tarasenko, Iryna Panteliadi, Ulyana Dryzhak, Oksana Solop, Alina and Anastasiia.

Presentations:

2024 – Rising. Learning from the Past Today for Tomorrow, IKM, Gdańsk, Poland
2025 – Between the (Un)imaginable and the Real, CSW Łaźnia, Gdańsk, Poland