Social science and arts students from Kosovo, Germany, and the Czech Republic will present their artistic works based on the theme, 'Places of memory--Memory of places in Europe,' a project organized by the Multimedia Center, Youth Initiative for Human Rights, the Collegium Bohemicum (Czech Republic) and the University of Dresden in Germany.

 

Four Kosovars, Four Germans, and Four Czechs will travel to various places together in the three countries together over the course of almost two weeks to explore and examine traces of history and war. During these 12 days they will explore the issue of memory in Kosovo, Germany and the Czech Republic.

 

So far, the students have visited Germany and Czech Republic. They will be in Kosovo from May 14th to May 20th. While in Kosovo, they will meet politicians, representatives of civil society, artists, victims and people who are still missing family members.

In particular, the memories of decisive events in history, like war, expulsion and migration are very much alive even years and decades later. People went through these experiences during the second world war, the time of communist rule and/or the Kosovo war during the century. This provides the opportunity to compare these experiences with each other; asking living witnesses how they survived or dealt with those times and memories.

Participants have prepared some works of art related to the project, which will be made public today, May 19th. The aim of the project is to give a new momentum to public discourse and to discuss the different backgrounds of the three countries and their unifying common humanity. The results will be presented on a web site, in a catalog and maybe in public exhibitions in Germany, Czech Republic and Kosovo.