The young often travel Ukraine and visit different festivals. Some of them are held not only in big cities but medium cities such as Ivano-Frankivsk, Ternopil, Poltava etc. Unfortunately, Mykolaiv has been off the record for a long time. The main issue we face in Mykolaiv is that there are many events that are predominantly local. Sometimes, it make take several weeks between non-commercial screening and exhibition opening.
Returning from one of the festivals to Mykolaiv our team decided not to wait till someone organizes the event but to do it on our own. We were developing and transforming the idea for several months. Its active implementation began with Project Pitching held by OUM in cooperation with British Council in Mykolaiv.
With educational support from OUM and financial help, two months of our project implementation were full of numerous appointments, organizational processes and some little setbacks. Lately, when the festival was close to its end, many people were asking me whether I was satisfied with the results. My only answer was: “I criticise myself a lot, and analyse what we have already done, but our visitors’ feedback brings me a lot of delight. People inspire we to keep on working.”
Project has a lot of feedbacks. News about Mykolaiv Art Week were absolutely positive, social networks were full of photos from the events though it included 5 events and took 4 days only and had significantly condensed program. Such public attention was organizators’ greatest reward.
During the last event of the project I announced that this was the fist but not the last festival of this format and we will definitely organize another Mykolaiv Art Week next year. We hope that together we will improve city life and make it more comfortable.
There is no need to wait for someone to do something instead of us, we should believe in our potential and that is the core idea of our project. LIttle steps are key to any changes.
