On 15 September 2026, London will host a large-scale international conference dedicated to Ukrainian cultural heritage and its place in history, the present and the future. The event is being organised by one of the world’s most renowned museums, the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A), as part of its ongoing work to study Ukrainian objects in its collections and to rethink approaches to the material culture of Eastern Europe.
This event is important for Ukraine not only in a scientific sense, but also symbolically. Since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, the global cultural community has become increasingly aware of the long-standing attempts to suppress, appropriate and rewrite Ukrainian history and identity. The conference at the V&A aims to bring these issues to the fore, create new opportunities for collaboration, and ensure a more accurate representation of Ukraine in a global context.
In recent years, the Victoria and Albert Museum has undertaken a number of projects aimed at researching Ukrainian cultural heritage in its collections. Among the most important initiatives is the collaboration with the curatorial team of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra. Together with Ukrainian experts, the museum is conducting in-depth research into two pairs of silver royal gates that once belonged to the monastery and are now part of the Gilbert V&A collection.
These gates are among the most valuable and complex examples of their kind outside the Orthodox Church environment. Research has also been carried out by graduate student Ada Wordsworth, who discovered a number of unique Ukrainian materials in the museum’s collections, including woodcuts from the 1920s, which opened up new horizons in the study of Ukrainian modernism.
The conference, which will take place in mid-September, will be the first event of this scale in the United Kingdom dedicated to Ukrainian material culture. Its goal is to bring together international experts, researchers and representatives of cultural institutions to jointly reflect on the past, present and future of Ukrainian heritage.
Among the key topics to be discussed are:
- How do material objects reflect the complex history of the Ukrainian nation, changing identities and geography in different eras?
- How did Ukrainian artefacts end up in British collections – through purchases, donations or looting?
- How are institutions rethinking the cataloguing and interpretation of Ukrainian collections today?
- What steps are museums taking to make their work visible to the public?
- How has Russia’s war against Ukraine affected the cultural heritage and work of Ukrainian institutions, and how are institutions in the UK responding?
This conference is more than an academic event. It is an attempt to rethink Ukraine’s place in world cultural history and, at the same time, a response to the challenges facing its heritage in times of war. The V&A is becoming one of the centres where Ukrainian cultural heritage gains a new voice and the international community acquires a deeper understanding of its significance.
The conference organisers are inviting researchers, museum professionals, cultural managers, lawyers, government officials and heritage conservation specialists to submit proposals for 20-minute presentations.
The deadline for submitting abstracts is 12 December 2025, and the selection results will be announced by 17 January 2026.