On June 25, 2019, at 7 PM, IZOLYATSIA presents the exhibition ‘From Wales to Ukraine: the Hughesovka story’. The exhibition is held within the Donbas Studies Summer School project. One of the main aim of the project is to show transnational roots of Eastern Ukraine’s industrialization.

Drawing on the riches housed at the Hughesovka Research Archive at the Glamorgan Archives, Cardiff, UK, this exhibition explores the history of migration from South Wales to Ukraine at the end of the nineteenth century. In 1868, the Welsh mining industrialist, John Hughes, together with a team of around a hundred Welsh miners set up a metallurgical plant and railway works in the coal and iron-ore rich territories of the Ekaterinoslav gubernia. Over the next decade, the migrant workforce built eight blast furnaces, collieries, mines, brickworks and rail lines. The British population established social and cultural institutions – an Anglican church, a British school, a hospital, and a fire service – but also more whimsical imitations of British life such as tearooms, tennis courts and amateur dramatics clubs. The exhibition showcases dozens of personal documents, including letters, memoirs, and photos, that reveal the hopes and anxieties of those who moved to Ukraine in search of a better life.

Exhibition curators:

Stefhan Caddick is an artist based in South Wales who works across a range of disciplines including archive film, installation and performance. Much of his work is socially engaged and often takes place in the dark. Stefhan has shown extensively across the UK and internationally. Recent projects include Noctule for Green Man festival and Ebbwferric, a research project funded by the Arts Council of Wales. http://stefhancaddick.co.uk;

Victoria Donovan is a Lecturer in Russian and the Director of the Centre for Russian, Soviet, Central and East European Studies at the University of St Andrews. She was a BBC/AHRC New Generation Thinker in 2016-2017 and a British Academy Rising Star Engagement Award holder in 2019.

Exhibition Opening:
Tuesday, June 25, 19:00

Exhibition Schedule:
June 25 – July 3, 10:00 – 20:00, without weekends

Address:
IZONE Creative Community, Naberezhno-Lugova Street 8, 4th floor