Exhibition
“In Search of Lost Meaning. Matvii Vaisberg”
on the Occasion of International Holocaust Remembrance Day
28 January – 15 February 2026
The Babyn Yar National Historical and Memorial Reserve, in partnership with the National Center “Ukrainian House,” presents an exhibition project dedicated to International Holocaust Remembrance Day, observed annually on 27 January, the anniversary of the liberation of prisoners from the Nazi death camp Auschwitz-Birkenau.
The project invites visitors to reflect on the memory of the Holocaust through the voices of public intellectuals, testimonies of survivors, archival film materials, the world’s first symphony dedicated to the Holocaust composed by Dmytro Klebanov, and works by Kyiv-based artist Matvii Vaisberg. Here, the Holocaust, the tragedy of Babyn Yar, and contemporary experiences of violence are explored not only as historical events, but above all as a shared existential challenge to humanity in a world where life has become fragile. Through the artist’s practice, his reflections on his own family history, and his search for meaning, the exhibition seeks to address a fundamental question: how does a person find meaning when the world has been shattered?
The exhibition brings together more than 200 paintings and graphic works by Matvii Vaisberg, created over the past three decades. During this period, the artist’s key thematic concerns take shape and unfold consistently, notably in the series and cycles Strange Houses, The Weak Anthropic Principle, Bruegel’s City, Maidan, Road Diary, and The Thin Red Line. These works represent a concentrated artistic reflection on the complex and painful issues of collective memory and trauma, contemporary challenges, and the ontological experience of the human condition. The central work of the exhibition, Seven Days, becomes a visual metaphor for the search for meaning—a movement from darkness to light, from chaos to structure, from loss to memory.
In Search of Lost Meaning. Matvii Vaisberg unites the personal and the universal, the past and the present, pain and hope, creating a space for reflection on how human dignity is preserved and how light can be found even in the darkest of times.
Exhibition opens to the public: from 11:00 AM on 28 January
Press preview: 27 January, 3:30 PM
Press accreditation contact: Kateryna Muzyka, +380 50 331 6206, [email protected]
Project organizers:
National Center “Ukrainian House”
Babyn Yar National Historical and Memorial Reserve
Project concept: Roza Tapanova
Creative team:
Roza Tapanova, Mariia Mizina, Mykhailo Alekseienko, Katia Lisova, Mykhailo Kulivnyk
Institutional partners:
Embassy of the State of Israel; Honorary Consulate of the State of Israel in Western Ukraine; Nativ Israeli Cultural Center; Central State Audiovisual and Electronic Archive; NGO “Center of Jewish Culture ‘Living Memory’”
Media partners: Suspilne Kultura, Radio Kultura
Opening hours:
Tuesday–Sunday: 11:00 AM – 7:00 PM
Monday: closed
Admission:
General – 150 UAH
Reduced – 70 UAH (for school pupils and students)
Participation in the “Kolo Domu” program provides year-long access to exhibitions at the Ukrainian House, guided tours within exhibition projects (for two people), and exclusive invitations to special events.
Membership card price: 1,500 UAH (available at the Ukrainian House ticket office).
Free admission is available for: pensioners; children under 7; persons with disabilities (Groups I–II); veterans, active military personnel and combatants; family members of fallen, captured or missing soldiers; Chernobyl disaster response participants; museum professionals; members of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine; holders of valid CIMAM, ICOM, and AICA membership cards.
Matvii Vaisberg (born 1958, Kyiv) is a Ukrainian artist. He graduated from the T. H. Shevchenko Republican Art Secondary School (1977) and the Kyiv Evening Faculty of the Ukrainian Printing Institute named after Ivan Fedorov, Department of Book Graphics (1985). He is a member of the artistic association “BZH-ART.” Vaisberg is the author of illustrations to works by Sholem Aleichem, José Ortega y Gasset, Carl Gustav Jung, Søren Kierkegaard, and others. His works have been exhibited in numerous group and solo exhibitions, including at the National Art Museum of Ukraine (Kyiv), the Wall Museum at Checkpoint Charlie (Berlin), the Ukrainian Institute of America (New York), the European House (London), among others. His works are held in the collections of the National Art Museum of Ukraine, the Odessa Museum of Modern Art, the National Museum “Kyiv Picture Gallery,” the Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum (Vilnius), as well as in museum and private collections worldwide.