CHSP: Labor, Exhaustion and Success. Company Towns in the Donbas

Type: 
Exhibition
Audience: 
Open to the Public
Building: 
Nador u. 9, Monument Building
Room: 
Octagon
Friday, May 22, 2015 - 5:30pm
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Date: 
Friday, May 22, 2015 - 5:30pm to Monday, June 15, 2015 - 12:00pm

The name of the Donbas region has recently appeared in the news due to the current political crisis and war there. In the late 19th century, however, its bare steppe served as the scene for one of the most ambitious industrial projects in Europe. News about the rich iron and coal deposits attracted people from various parts of the Russian Empire, Europe and beyond. Most cities in the Donbas, such as Donetsk, Luhansk, Kramatorsk, emerged from nothing around the newly established industrial enterprises to provide housing for the workers and the management. The structure of these company towns, the whole rhythm of life there, the surrounding landscape and even human relations were organized by and around a mine or a factory. Over the Soviet period they developed into large and medium size cities constituting a dense urban network. The aim of the exhibition is to present the history of company towns and their influence on the past and present social, economic and cultural environment in the Donbas region and thus contribute to a more complex and critical public understanding also of the most recent events there.

The poster exhibition was created by Volodymyr Kulikov (Karazin Kharkiv National University) and Iryna Sklokina (Center for Urban History of East Central Europe in Lviv).

Opening of the exhibition: Friday, 22 May 2015, 17.30

Opening remarks by Professor Alfred Rieber