Art is Urgent — Emergency Residencies for Ukrainian Artists

Art is Urgent was an emergency residency programme developed in 2022 in response to the displacement of artists and families following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The first residency was initiated and self-managed by Karne Kunst, rapidly transforming Projektraum Coswig into a safe living and working environment offering free accommodation, workspace and community support to Ukrainian artists and their families. A second residency was later developed with support from the Culture of Solidarity Fund – Ukraine Special Edition, expanding the model through basic living support, artistic production, mentoring and professional networking. Marcela Villanueva led the project management, programme development and fundraising. The residencies resulted in the exhibitions No Words for War and Ukrainian Glances, both curated by Villanueva, with No Words for War later expanding at CLB Berlin into a public programme around artistic mobility, cultural funding, displacement and arrival in Germany.The residency supported Ukrainian artists Elina Bilous, Iryna Daragan-Bogodist, Lidiia Moroz, Natalie Golubenko, Svitlana Galdetska and Vladyslava Kriuk, alongside artist-researcher Samantha Justine Domingo. Their work developed into No Words for War, curated by Marcela Villanueva and first presented at Projektraum Coswig before travelling to CLB Berlin. The Berlin presentation expanded the exhibition into a week-long programme addressing artistic mobility, access to cultural funding, crisis and displacement, and the experiences of newly arrived artists, in collaboration with organisations and cultural workers including Touring Artists, LAK Berlin and Berlin Artists Connected.