1Soviet Ukraine came out of the Second World War (1939-1945) in a new capacity: it became a unified state, incorporating its historical lands in one state, became a prominent subject of international law, gaining the right to be a founding member of the United Nations and an active member of dozens of international organizations at the cost of millions of human lives.
2It should be noted that despite Russia’s constant proclamation of victory in the World War II, without Ukraine’s and other allies’ involvement in hostilities, it would never have defeated the Third Reich.
3Until recently, historians have mostly argued about the losses of Ukraine, whose territory was fought over in 1941-1945 from West to East and from East to West. Over 7 million citizens wore Red Army uniforms in Ukraine during the said war, which accounted for 23% of the personnel of the USSR armed forces. In addition, about 120,000 Ukrainians faced the Nazis in September 1939 as part of the Polish army (mostly Polish citizens who came from Galicia and Volhynia, which were part of interwar Poland); on the fronts spreading from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean, from Norway to Egypt, Ukrainians fought as part of the armed forces of the United States (80,000), the British Empire (45,000), France (6,000), and other countries. These were mostly representatives of the Ukrainian diaspora in the above countries.
4However, there is little dispute that Ukraine suffered perhaps the most casualties in this war, both military and civilian, because the USSR viewed Ukrainians as human resources. “Ukraine’s total human losses due to the war, including those killed, dead, victims of concentration camps, deportees, evacuees, and those who retreated with the Germans, amount to up to 14 million people. From January 1, 1941, to January 1, 1945, the population of Ukraine decreased from 40.9 million to 27 million people” (Lysenko & Perekhrest, 2015). The material losses of the USSR amounted to about 40% of the total losses of all countries that participated in the World War II. At the same time, Ukraine’s share of the USSR’s losses constituted about 40%.
5But today, the history is repeating itself, except it is not the Third Reich that is attacking Ukraine, but Russia. Now, during the full-scale Russian-Ukrainian war, the Russians have already committed a huge number of war crimes and crimes against humanity. The actions of the Russian armed forces bear all the hallmarks of Nazi atrocities.
6As we can see, the Third Reich’s ally in the first phase of the war, the Communist Soviet Union, took advantage of the victory over Nazism and strengthened its position in the world. Its successor, in particular, in the ideological dimension, was the Russian Federation, which is an aggressor country and the sponsor of terrorism in the world, initiated and was involved in numerous crimes (genocides, military interventions, punitive psychiatry, development and the use of prohibited weapons, etc.).
7Similarly, attempts to hide behind the moral authority of the winner of the World War II to pursue an aggressive policy in Ukraine today are unacceptable. Therefore, the current Russian government is a destroyer of the system of international relations established by the victorious states of the World War II.
8At one time, the United States Defense Assistance Act, better known as the Lend-Lease, helped the Soviet army defeat the Nazis. And the “shuttle” operations (1944) of the USSR and US Air Forces, codenamed “Frank”, which operated from airfields located in one of the regions of Ukraine, namely Poltava region, were not only a great example of international cooperation, but likewise a feat of the military and civilian population of Ukraine.
9The Russian aggression in Ukraine today has shown the relevance of old aid instruments. In fact, many European countries, as well as Canada, Japan, and Australia, have already introduced procedures similar to the American Land-Lease, namely the free transfer of weapons and equipment to Ukraine. Thanks to the military support, Ukraine will be able to more successfully resist Russian attacks and, at a favorable scenario, regain some of the occupied territories.
10Today, the war in Ukraine is causing thousands of casualties, destruction of civilian infrastructure and educational institutions. The number of casualties and damages will be estimated when the hostilities are stopped. Since the first days of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russian troops, civilians, hospitals, orphanages, schools, universities and residential areas have been targeted by shelling and air strikes in various parts of Ukraine. As a result of Russia’s full-scale aggression in Ukraine, 215 educational institutions have been completely destroyed, and more than 2,000 have been damaged (but the destruction continues nonetheless).
11Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the occupiers have committed more than 550 war crimes against the cultural heritage of Ukraine. Most of them are related to the Kharkiv region, and this is still ongoing (https://culturecrimes.mkip.gov.ua).
12According to the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine, as of May 27, 20877 crimes against Ukraine were registered, including 14193 crimes of aggression and war crimes and 6684 crimes against national security (“Voyenni zlochyny pid chas viyny Rosiyi proty Ukrayiny”, 2022).
13As of this writing, 1663 people, including 74 children, have been killed by the occupiers in the Kharkiv region. These numbers are constantly fluctuating since there is daily shelling, houses are destroyed, and civilians are killed.
14But despite full-scale hostilities in Ukraine, especially in Kharkiv, cultural life and educational processes continue to be provided in full. Teachers and cultural workers have to work in the difficult and unfavorable conditions that the warfare has subjected them to.
15In this article, we set out to analyze and compare how the artistic and pedagogical educational process took place during the two wars, as well as to introduce little-known facts that took place in the educational space in 1941-1943 and 2022 during the hostilities in the Kharkiv region.
16The review of the educational process in its historical retrospective will be based mainly on two educational institutions: H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National Pedagogical University (H.S. Skovoroda KhNPU), Faculty of Arts, Department of Fine Arts, as an example of educational processes in the war of 2022, and the Kharkiv State Academy of Design and Arts (KhSADA), which during the 1941-45 war was called the Kharkiv Art Institute (abbreviated as KhAI).
17Why were these very institutions specified? The author of the article is the Head of the Department of Fine Arts at H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National Pedagogical University. Therefore, since the eruption of the military conflict, the Head of the Department has been staying in Kharkiv, directly involved in the organization of the educational process at H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National Pedagogical University and has the opportunity to compare the educational process both from a scientific point of view and as a direct participant and eyewitness of the military conflict of 2022 with her early research on artistic and pedagogical education in Ukraine in the twentieth century, including the period of occupation of Kharkiv, which began on October 24, 1941 and lasted intermittently until the Day of Liberation of the city on August 23, 1943.
18The purpose of the article is to conduct a comparative analysis of the art education during the period of military confrontation.
19Literature review. Ukrainian historiography still lacks a comprehensive study of art education during the German occupation. The topic of occupation in the region was considered to be mainly in the context of the terror and arbitrariness of the Nazi invaders, the plundering of the national wealth of the Ukrainian SSR by the occupiers, and criticism of Ukrainian nationalists (Materialy pro robotu, n.d.; Skorobahatov, 2004).
20Analysis of the scientific literature suggests that the historiographical field of research does not always include a wide range of state and regulatory materials on higher artistic and pedagogical education, and most of these provisions have been unclaimed in archival institutions for many years.
21To collect the necessary factual material, archival documents of various funds have been analyzed, namely: The Central State Archive of Higher Authorities and Governance of Ukraine, the State Archive of Kharkiv Region, the Branch Archive of the Security Service of Ukraine in Kharkiv Region, personal archives of H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National Pedagogical University, and the Kharkiv State Academic Museum of History.
22As for the information on the current war between Ukraine and Russia, they used their own experience, interviewed contemporaries who are directly experiencing this war in evacuation or occupation, or providing training in Kharkiv universities. The author of this article has been conducting scientific observation, recording, interviews, and questionnaires in Kharkiv since the onset of the warfare on February 24 and until now.
23The war beginning. On February 24, 2022, most teachers in Kharkiv held their online classes. There was some confusion, but there were no official orders on the organization of the educational process on the morning of February 24.
24Panic and confusion increased over the evening of February 24 and into the morning of February 25, when it became clear to everyone that this was a bloody war. The bombardment of Kharkiv intensified: by airplanes, rockets, cluster bombs. Houses, universities, schools, and administrative buildings were destroyed. In the morning at about 4:58 a.m., on 24.02.2022, Kharkiv was shelled by Smerch multiple rocket launchers, which are prohibited from shelling civilian objects, and military installations were hit (Chuhuiv military airfield, located not far from Kharkiv (38 km away), was one of the first to be shelled, as well as the barracks of military academies. At 05:30, Presidential Decree No. 64/2022 introduced the martial law in Ukraine.
25The Kharkiv Metro opened on schedule at 5:30 a.m. and started operating in a regular mode. However, at 9:00 a.m., the subway was used as a bomb shelter. Electric trains continued to run between stations. However, at about 15:00, trains stopped running. After that, traffic was stopped, and the city’s residents, who were fleeing Russian shells and bombs, were sheltering in the cars of the electric trains.
26In the early days, Kharkiv was defended by the 92nd Separate Mechanized Brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which was tasked with defending the state border. Therefore, the Ukrainian military began to equip defensive positions along Kharkiv. The 92nd Mechanized Brigade was then joined by the 3rd Brigade of the National Guard and a separate Omega Special Forces unit.
27The Ukrainian Armed Forces struggled clearly and cohesively, as a result Kharkiv was not surrendered, which made it possible to avoid being occupied and maintain a relatively normal lifestyle in the city.
28Nevertheless, there was some panic in the city, all the food disappeared from the stores in the first weeks, shops did not operate, some residents tried to leave the city’s limits, others stayed in the subway or bomb shelters for days. However, the panic and hysteria ended in a couple of weeks.
29Those who wanted and could leave the city managed to do it, those who were hiding in the subway eagerly provided each other with the necessary assistance (ranging from hygiene, food, medical services to children’s animation), the banking system gradually started functioning, humanitarian aid was being imported and actively distributed, grocery stores began to open where one could buy everything he/she needed, and an extensive system of humanitarian aid distribution was in place.
30Hostilities in Ukraine. Since the beginning of hostilities in Ukraine, the Russian army has been deliberately destroying private homes and high-rise buildings, shops, parks, archives, schools, university buildings, etc. The whole world already knows that one of the largest residential areas in Europe, Northern Saltovka, with its entire infrastructure, was almost completely destroyed.
31One of the buildings of the H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National University located in Saltivka borough was unfortunately destroyed, and other university’s buildings were partially damaged. From the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion until October, 11,397 objects were destroyed in the Kharkiv region. Among them are high-rise buildings, private houses, administrative buildings, churches, schools, kindergartens, etc. (Riazantseva, 2022). And this figure is growing every day.
32According to Kharkiv historians, in 1941-43, German aircraft did not bomb or destroy Kharkiv so intensively as the Russian army. The Germans wanted to capture Kharkiv intact, and they destroyed the hub stations to make it less possible to take away the equipment of factories and plants. Of course, some bombs hit houses, but the main task was to stop the export of important industrial equipment from Kharkiv (Otchet o rabote, n.d.).
33However, the Russian military had a different task in February 2022. An army of bandits, thieves, and rapists who hated everything Ukrainian was approaching Kharkiv. When the Russian military realized that they could not capture Kharkiv and that the city would not take the Russian side, they began to destroy all civilian infrastructure.
34H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National University. It should be noted that most Kharkiv universities remained in place, including the H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National University, which was at the epicenter of the Russian-Ukrainian war. In the first days of the war, the rector of H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National University, Prof. Yuriy Boychuk, together with the vice-directors, organized an operational headquarters at the university premises, held online and offline meetings, academic council meetings, labor meetings of the staff, actively communicated with colleagues and students, resolved issues of the university’s functioning under martial law, and asked for help from Ukrainian universities to resettle evacuated university teachers and students.
35Poltava V.G. Korolenko National Pedagogical University, Vinnytsia Mykhailo Kotsiubynskyi State Pedagogical University, Ternopil Volodymyr Hnatiuk National Pedagogical University, Pavlo Tychyna Uman State Pedagogical University, and Khmelnytskyi National University responded to the call and provided concrete assistance to teachers in difficult life situations.
36Bohdan Buyak, Director of Volodymyr Hnatiuk Ternopil National Pedagogical University, provided shelter for teachers and their families, ensured the delivery of humanitarian goods to Kharkiv, and created opportunities for students’ academic mobility at H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National Pedagogical University.
37In these difficult times for our country, the support of many foreign partner universities was and is invaluable, not only expressing words of solidarity with the academic community and students of our university, but likewise offering assistance during this period of trial. Cardiff University, UK, was one of the first to respond.
38The Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine suspended the educational process in Ukraine on February 25, 2012 and sent everyone on vacation. The educational process in all higher education institutions resumed on April 1, remotely via online conferences, using various platforms such as Moodle, Zoom, Google meet, Viber, Whats Up, Telegram, Skype or mobile networks, as well as email correspondence.
39Statistical data and migration of students. However, since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by the Russian army and the Kharkiv region itself, university professors have been compiling lists of students: those who are under occupation, those who are in need, and those who have left Ukraine, and promptly contact them to render assistance.
40Statistical data and migration of students of the Faculty of Arts of H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National Pedagogical University in the first month of the war are shown in table 1.
Table 1. Statistical data as of 11.03.2022.
41*Excluding foreign students; Excluding students on academic leave; In Ukraine – including students who are currently in settlements where military operations are underway. Information on the place of residence of students of the Faculty of Arts was compiled as of 11.03.22 by the Deputy Dean for Educational Work of the Faculty of Arts of the H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National Pedagogical University, Associate Professor, V. P. Zhukov.
42In parallel with the educational process in Ukraine, a system of academic mobility was organized that made it possible for students to freely choose and remotely take courses in relevant educational programs in various higher education institutions in Ukraine and abroad.
43Due to the use of modern information and communication technologies, the graduates were certified and issued documents on obtaining the appropriate level of education in June and December 2022.
44Despite the active hostilities, the constant sounds of air raid sirens, and bombing, teachers and students of H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National University managed to organize and hold a number of conferences, online art exhibitions, art events, and mural paintings that raised the morale of Kharkiv residents.
45Despite Marcus Tullius Cicero’s famous phrase “Inter Arma Silent Musae” (when guns speak, art is silent), it was art that, on the contrary, spoke life-affirming words and helped many people to survive the crisis, despair, fear, despondency, and relieve the fear of loneliness for a while.
46Since ancient times, war has had the ability to generate written and visual stories about itself, and it is the visual arts that are a visual testament to the war, forming an emotional cast of every day of Ukrainian resistance; allowing us to demonstrate both the horrors of war and give hope for better, peaceful times, and recalling the fundamental values of human existence.
47Art does not form some independent territory of freedom, but reflects the freedom-loving dynamics of social attitudes that have organically developed in Ukrainian society over the past three decades. There is no fear in contemporary Ukrainian art. In art we find a reflection and rethinking of the reality of time. “The art born during the war will speak for us longer than we live” (Zakharchuk, 2022).
48Teachers and students of the Faculty of Arts. Teachers and students of the Faculty of Arts of H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National Pedagogical University did not stand aside and depicted everything they observed and felt in their artworks: they recreated the events, the terrible destruction of cities and towns they witnessed, hopes and expectations, personal experiences on a real or virtual canvas, creating their own Ukrainian artistic front.
49Of course, the previous years of covid quarantine, when the entire educational process took place online, helped teachers and students to quickly communicate, organize groups in various messengers, and continue not only online learning but likewise artistic activities.
50In the spring and summer alone, a number of events and exhibitions were prepared in support of the destroyed Skovoroda Museum, whose 300th anniversary was celebrated by the whole of Ukraine and the civilized world. These are online exhibitions such as: “In the Footsteps of H.S. Skovoroda”, a poster contest “War in Ukraine through the Eyes of Children”, together with Lyubotyn Gymnasium No. 5, Kharkiv region; holding an art contest “In the Footsteps of H.S. Skovoroda – 300 years”.
51As well as II International Online Conference “Paradigms of Art and Technology Education: Modern Challenges and Solutions” in cooperation with Ivan Franko Drohobych State Pedagogical University (Department of Technological and Professional Education; Head, Professor Leonid Orshanskyi) and Changchun University, People’s Republic of China (Faculty of Visual Arts). The conference was attended by over 70 scholars, lecturers and teachers, masters and graduate students from different parts of Ukraine – Kharkiv, Poltava, Chernihiv, Hlukhiv, Vinnytsia, Uman, Kremenets, etc.
52Numerous excursions to museums around the world were organized during thematic lectures using the Google arts&culture service.
53In February 2022, just like in the fall of 1941, the university and the teachers who remained in Kharkiv faced the task of maintaining the educational process, the staff, the departmental and university property, as well as modernizing the teaching methods in accordance with the challenges of wartime.
54The evacuation in 2022 and 1941. The evacuation in February and March 2022 was more humane than at the beginning of the war in 1941. Of course, civilians could have been better prepared for the consequences of the war. But in this article, we will not aim at evaluating the country’s leadership. We will only note that the review of archival documents makes it possible for us to analyze the way the evacuation of people from Kharkiv took place in early September 1941.
55If the Soviet authorities had started evacuating Kharkiv factories that were important for the defense capability of the USSR and their leading specialists employed at these factories in August 1941, but not in September of the same year, it would have been possible to evacuate not only the factory equipment but likewise most of the Kharkiv residents. But the Soviet government never spared people, so in order not to congest the main highways and roads, especially the railroad, the local population was forbidden to leave Kharkiv. This was controlled by the police and the PCIA (People’s Commissariat of Internal Affairs of the USSR) (Otchet o rabote, n.d.).
56Despite the fact that Soviet troops were retreating, the educational process began on time on September 1. It was necessary to pretend that everything was under control and the situation was stable. It should be clarified that before the war, the Department of Arts decided to unite a number of art schools. Thus, the Kharkiv Art Institute was merged with the Kyiv Art Institute under the common name of the Ukrainian Academy of Arts.
57According to the documents, at the beginning of September 1, 1941, there were 129 students at the Kharkiv Art Institute, only half of the students arrived for studies, “because some of the graduate students... who arrived from military schools to complete their studies (according to the decree of the People's Commissariat of Defense) went home to pack their stuff. Some of the students did not return from their places of residence; they were sent a second notice to come to study” (Panok, 2016).
58The organized training lasted only 3 days from 1.09 to 3.09. 1941. According to the documents, all available students and the teaching staff were put to fortification work on 4.09, as the front was approaching.
59During the war period, both in 1941 and in 2022, changes took place in the life and work of most Kharkiv higher education institutions: in the context of the proximity of the front and hostilities, an urgent restructuring of the educational process to meet the needs of wartime began, the student and teaching staff changed, and all its disciplines were actively involved in various forms of assistance to the front, sometimes to the detriment of the educational process, which was shortened. Students and teachers volunteered, wove camouflage nets, and helped the front as much as they could.
60Of course, in 1941 it was much harder for the civilian population of Ukraine, because there were battles all over the territory and the Western regions were the first to suffer... The German army still had to reach Kharkiv, having captured Lviv, Vinnytsia, Kyiv, Poltava, and other Ukrainian cities. Therefore, at the outbreak of the war, a large number of refugees from other parts of Ukraine accumulated in Kharkiv.
61According to various estimates, there were between 300 and 400 thousand refugees in Kharkiv. Kharkiv was the third city in the Soviet Union in terms of the number of industrial enterprises, so the local population believed that it would not be surrendered” (Otchet o rabote, n.d.).
62The Executive Committee of the Kharkiv Regional Council, in accordance with the resolution of the Council of People’s Commissars of the Ukrainian SSR “On Preparations for the Academic Year 1941-1942”, provides information about the functioning of institutes and colleges and notes that, according to the list, the academic building of the Kharkiv Art Institute will be converted into a hospital... (Materialy pro evakuatsiyu, n.d., p. 4).
63At the beginning of the occupation of Kharkiv (the German army entered Kharkiv on October 24, 1941), there were about 34 higher education institutions in the city with a student population of 28,283 and a faculty of 2,875 (Materialy pro robotu, n.d., p. 35).
64Comparison of March 2022 and September 1941. Compared to the beginning of the war in March 2022, Kharkiv had 69 higher education institutions, including 19 universities and 9 academies with different specializations: from technical to agricultural, from military to creative, from medical to economic. More than 160,000 students were enrolled in Kharkiv’s universities, including about 12,000 foreign students.
65Only at the end of September 1941, the Council of People’s Commissars began the evacuation of higher education institutions, and the Kharkiv Art Institute moved to Engels, Saratov Oblast, from where some of the teachers and students moved to Samarkand (Uzbekistan), while others, including the director of the Art Institute I. Avgust, remained in Saratov (Panok, 2016, p. 338).
66In total, almost 300 people had gathered by December of the same year. To equip classrooms and dormitories, the Samarkand Regional Executive Committee provided ten buildings: the Shir Dor Madrassa, the Ulug-Bek Madrassa, several mosques and schools, two teahouses, etc. Only in December 1941 did any educational process begin (Panyok, 2016, p. 339).
67Unlike in 1941, in February 2022, a few days after the outbreak of war, local authorities organized the evacuation of foreign students and some Kharkiv residents to safer Ukrainian cities, mainly in Western Ukraine. Special trains were organized to provide the evacuation of teachers so that they could leave the city safely without panic and stampede that prevailed at the railway station... The railway operated meritoriously and people were taken to Western Ukraine in an organized manner and free of charge.
68Educational process in the wars. Despite the unfavorable military conditions, artistic and pedagogical education in the spring of 2022 remained highly professional. Teachers were in touch with students 24/7 both in a synchronous and asynchronous mode and provided online consultations to all students as soon as their reports and homework assignments were received.
69Students were allowed to accomplish their artistic educational tasks with whatever they had at hand, as all art supplies stores in Kharkiv were closed (art stores opened later, almost at the beginning of summer). Paper, paints, and other art supplies were the very last thing on the minds of students and their parents when they were fleeing Russian bombs.
70Therefore, it was very difficult to accomplish the training assignments. However, those who were hiding in the subway asked for paper and paint from volunteers, and those who were able to settle in safer places ultimately obtained art staff. Those who stayed at home were able to work almost in full, since they had some supplies of paints and paper stored at home. Students who went abroad asked for art stuff from volunteers to complete their homework.
71How did the educational process take place in occupied Kharkiv and in evacuation during the war of 1941-43? Based on the results of historical and theoretical analysis, it was found that due to a number of life circumstances, some students and some teachers (about 45 people in total) remained in Kharkiv: M. Burachek, M. Zubar, I. Ivanov, M. Kozyk, O. Kokel, M. Samokysh, O. Symonov, S. Prokhorov, etc. (Perepyska s otdelom upravy, n.d., p. 34, 99).
72On the initiative of the German command, the Kharkiv Art Institute was granted national status and continued to work under the leadership of the Ukrainian artist M. Kozyk (1941-1942). However, the educational process of the Kharkiv National Art Institute during this period was determined by counter-reforms on the part of the German authorities: the goals and content of education were changed, aimed at changing the public and individual consciousness, and the basic conceptual provisions of education were changed.
73The system of Stalin’s authoritarian pedagogy was replaced by the equally totalitarian pedagogy of the German Wehrmacht. Under the occupation, it was difficult to resolve the issue of the correlation between separate cycles of academic disciplines for certain specialties, including art and pedagogy, because instead of higher education, the Reich Commissariat of Ukraine introduced vocational education (mainly medical, technical, and cultural).
74One of the positive factors was the permission to teach subjects in the Ukrainian language and to refer, albeit to a limited extent, to Ukrainian national artistic traditions. At the same time, it should be noted that on the territory of the Reich Commissariat of Ukraine, the authorities were wary of any representatives of the national intelligentsia as potential traitors and rebels. Thus, 3 thousand educators were executed in Kharkiv during the entire period of occupation (“Ukrayinsʹka kulʹtura v roky nimetsʹko-radyansʹkoyi viyny”, 2022).
75The Arts Sector, which was located in the Kharkiv City Council, managed all artistic educational institutions and developed the relevant charters, curricula, programs, lecture notes, and determined the staff for each type of institution. It was the Executive Office for arts that drew up the work plan for the art institute. It was planned to resume the work of the art institute’s painting, sculpture, lithography, and photography workshops, as well as to organize a permanent exhibition of students’ artistic activities for teachers (Perepyska s otdelom upravy, n.d., p. 74; Polozhenye ob otdele, n.d., p. 44) (fig. 1).
Figure 1. A letter from the education department of the city administration about the survey and the expediency of the work of auxiliary workshops (Perepyska s otdelom upravy, n.d., p. 46).
76Classes could not start for a long time, and, as the Head of the Administration Department V. Kostenko noted, “despite all the measures taken by the education department, the art institute has not been able to deploy its academic and educational part until now (October 1942-T. P.)... students have scattered, the faculty is not working” (Panok, 2016, p. 342).
77Despite the fact that the institute’s management was instructed to develop curricula, programs, identify textbooks and other necessary educational literature, and prepare classrooms, full-fledged academic classes failed to have started. The entire educational process took place mainly in workshops in the form of consultations or individual lessons for a small group of students (3-5 people) (Perepyska s otdelom upravy, n.d., p. 62).
78According to the minutes of the meeting of the board of the National Art Institute, the statute of the institution was approved, regulations on the artistic council were developed, the working hours of the production workshops were determined, and a schedule of consultations between teachers and students was developed. Thus, consultations took place in the morning from 11 to 13 hours: Professor O. Kokel received students on Tuesday; Professor M. Kozik – on Wednesday; Professor S. Prokhorov – on Friday; Professor M. Dobronravov – on Saturday.
79Life under occupation required from the management and teachers of the art institute to direct artistic training to studio and production work so as to bring it closer to the occupation needs: serving the German army with exhibition work, developing creative activities for the production of religious images, icons, portraits of German military and Ukrainian national figures, etc. (fig. 2-2a).
Figure 2. Report of prof. O. Kramarenko about the work of the Kharkiv Art Institute (Perepyska s otdelom upravy, n.d., р. 98).
Figure 2a. Continuation, report of prof. O. Kramarenko reverse side (Perepyska s otdelom upravy, n.d., р. 98).
80The establishment of the educational and production work of the lithography workshop contributed to more productive work in the painting workshop. Students and teachers had the opportunity to combine both production and study: various signs, lithographic posters, labels, Christmas cards, playing cards (based on drawings by H. Narbut), copies of paintings by famous Ukrainian landscape painters, etc. were designed and printed (Polozhenye ob otdele, n.d, p. 46; Perepyska s otdelom upravy, n.d., p. 56, 62). The value, uniqueness, integrity of a personality, his or her right to free development and manifestation of one own’s abilities were not taken into account in the new pedagogical concept of education.
81The Department of Education tried to create a scientific and certification commission at the Kharkiv National Art Institute consisting of: M. Kozyk, M. Burachek, S. Prokhorov, O. Symonov and M. Zubar (Otchet o rabote, n.d., p. 13), and the city government developed a project in which it proposed to assemble a special Artistic Council at the institute, which could consider and authorize all events, projects, and works of art and architecture in Kharkiv (Perepyska s otdelom, n.d., p. 58).
82The teachers understood the importance and responsibility of establishing the educational process, as the issue of the feasibility of the institution’s existence as such was being decided in September 1942.
83The position of Oberburgomaster V. Sienyk was unequivocal: “the institute must exist regardless of the number of students, and the university studies can be conducted in the form of studio work” (Perepyska s otdelom, n.d., p. 6). According to archival materials, as of January 1, 1943, there were only 25 students at the institute (Polozhenye ob otdele, n.d., p. 1, 3).
84During the occupation period of 1941-1943, the teachers of the Art Institute were able not only to adapt the educational process and programs to wartime, but also to preserve the valuable methodological developments that had been developed by teachers in the pre-war period. As artists-academics, they recognized working with nature as the main type of all artistic and pedagogical work. Therefore, even in those difficult times, the students of the institution worked with nature, most often officers and soldiers of the Wehrmacht or their allies (Romanian and Italian military).
85The educational process in Kharkiv region. Of course, in 2022, the educational process was more orderly, and despite the devastating blow to the education sector and the enormous destruction of infrastructure, the extent of which cannot be quickly tracked and assessed due to the continuous shelling, occupation and active hostilities in most of the Kharkiv region, it provided educational services in full.
86At the same time, we note that there was and still is a lack of access to education for some students, even in the distance format that has become common since the pandemic. For most participants in the educational process, there are no opportunities for normal communication. This deepens the psychological trauma caused by the warfare.
87The situation in Kharkiv and the region is extremely heterogeneous and ambiguous, as a significant part of the territory is directly affected by the war, there are various types of community territories occupation, different intensities of hostilities and enemy shelling of settlements, destruction of critical infrastructure, especially energy infrastructure, without which online learning is impossible, etc. This makes it impossible to develop and apply a single format for continuing and completing the educational process. However, despite the extremely difficult conditions, the university continues to operate and provide educational services in full.
88At the end of the article, I would like to end with the words of the Director of H.S. Skovoroda Kharkiv National University, Prof. Yurii Boichuk: “Despite the martial law, significant destruction in Kharkiv and at the University, difficulties experienced at the life and professional levels, the ‘Skovoroda family’ is united and strong, and continues its activities. Everyone is responsible for his own ‘front’ of work. And while the army is fighting fiercely on the battlefields, teachers pore over work at the educational, cultural, and scientific front. We have many scientific plans ahead of us and we are confident that we will succeed in implementing them for the sake of Victory, for the sake of Ukraine”.
89Today, Ukraine, the United States, and the European community can draw on the bitter experience and historical lessons learned during World War II to organize effective resistance to the Russian aggressor. No country can claim to recognize its exceptional role in the victory over Nazism. Victory is the fruit of the titanic efforts of dozens of states and hundreds of peoples.
90The crimes of the Russian Federation in Ukraine will certainly be put to an end, and the Russian Putin regime will be condemned and defeated by the joint efforts of the entire civilized world, just as the Nazi Third Reich was in its time.