This year, the 14th International Book Arsenal Festival will be held from May 28 (the evening of the official opening) to May 31. The festival will consist of the program component and the book fair, which will take place on the first floor of the Old Arsenal building.
“Bear Your Freedom” is the Focus Theme of the 14th International Book Arsenal Festival. We will speak about freedom and its limitations, about captivity and occupation as one of its forms, about heroization and the fragility of heroes. The curator of this year’s Focus Theme is Ukrainian journalist, human rights activist, serviceman, and former prisoner of war Maksym Butkevych.
This year, the Festival also marks the return of the Writer’s Program, curated by Ukrainian Armed Forces serviceman, volunteer, poet, novelist, and translator Andriy Lyubka. The curator invites visitors to reflect on our neighbors.
The Main Program of this year’s Festival will be curated by cultural manager, lecturer in literature courses, researcher of intertextual and intercultural connections Valentyna Sotnykova.
The Kids Program, curated by writer, journalist and translator Olya Rusina, will also take place within Book Arsenal.
The Special Teens Program is being prepared by participants of LitLab Teens and the Youth Council of the Mystetskyi Arsenal.
The Professional Program will be run by manager of cultural and educational projects, editor, literary scholar Yuliia Konopliana.
The 14th Book Arsenal will host the Festival of First Plays and the Theatre of Veterans with a special program.
A Special program will also be presented by the executive producer of Radio Kultura, journalist, translator, and writer Iryna Slavinska.
The Classical Music Program is being prepared by musicologist Liuba Morozova.
The third season of the Book Arsenal Fellowship Program will be coordinated by project manager Mariia Surzhenko. It will be a platform for B2B meetings and introductions of foreign publishers, rights managers and literary agents to the Ukrainian book market.
Publishers will also hold independent events within the Book Arsenal program.
The full event program will be available on the website soon.
The general media partner of the 14th International Book Arsenal Festival will be Suspilne.
Book Arsenal is organized in cooperation with Art Arsenal Community NGO. The Festival is supported by the International Renaissance Foundation and Mnozhyna Foundation.