Why start a festival during a war?
Updated: 4 hours ago
Denyshi rocks, Ukraine, photographed on 22 May 2016. Location photograph, not the Stoned Climbers festival. Photo: Oneks22 / Wikimedia Commons. CC BY-SA 4.0. Display may be cropped to fit. Image source · Reuse licence
Why start a festival during a war?
When a country is facing air raids, mobilisation, displacement and enormous pressure on public resources, starting a new festival might seem fairly low down the list of priorities.
But the Stoned Climbers festival in Ukraine offers a fascinating example of why people create new events even under these circumstances. Held near Denyshi, the festival was first organised in 2023, after the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, with around 150 participants. It has since grown to more than 500. Combining climbing and live music, it takes place within the realities of wartime Ukraine: air-raid alerts, soldiers attending while on leave, restrictions on everyday life, and fundraising for the military.
Co-founder Dmytro Isaienko describes the festival as providing recreation and escape, but also community, connection and a way of maintaining something resembling ordinary social life. We often talk about the resilience of events: how festivals and event organisations survive crises and disruption. But what about resilience through events? Can events themselves become part of the social infrastructure through which communities cope with prolonged conflict?
And if they can, what are the mechanisms involved? Social connection? Collective identity? Morale? Volunteering? Economic activity? Or simply creating spaces in which people can temporarily experience normality?
We also need to be careful about romanticising “resilience”. Events taking place during war can simultaneously provide community and escape, raise funds for military purposes, operate within wartime restrictions, and reflect the wider politics of the conflict.
This is what makes Stoned Climbers particularly interesting. This isn’t an existing festival adapting in order to survive the war. It was created during the war.
That raises a different set of questions: why do new events emerge under conditions of armed conflict? What needs do they meet that weren’t being met before? And what can their emergence tell us about the role of events in societies experiencing war?
The Associated Press report on Stoned Climbers is well worth reading:https://apnews.com/article/23a07df09cc72ebba4fd1e60fe3adfcb
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