Unissued Diplomas puts a face to “interrupted lives” in Ukraine

By: Jonathan Shaw, Educational Developer

Polina had planned to be an English teacher and dreamed of visiting the ocean with her fiancé, but she was killed in an artillery strike in March at the age of 20. Oleksandra had been studying Spanish and Turkish and wanted to be a diplomat, but she died in July at the age of 18 when she was hit by Russian missile as she headed to a driving lesson.

These are just two of the 36 young Ukrainians featured in a photographic exhibition that opened on Tuesday at Saint Mary’s. More than 50 universities around the world are hosting the “Unissued Diplomas” installation to commemorate the lives of Ukrainian university students killed during the Russian war against Ukraine, which has now entered its second year.

Each photograph is paired with a ‘diploma’ that provides biographical notes, and they are all connected by red string representing what Kateryna Rudenko calls the “blood thread of interrupted life”. One of three Ukrainian student organizers of the exhibition at Saint Mary’s, Kateryna was displaced by the war and is now studying at Dalhousie University. “As Ukrainian students abroad, it’s our duty to tell the stories of these young people, which all assemble into one narrative of Ukrainian resistance,” she says.

Some of these students were killed while going about their lives on the streets of towns and cities across Ukraine, while others were soldiers who fell on the battlefield. “With this exhibition we would like to show that full-scale war in Ukraine is still going on. Every day, our country has losses among civilians and military. The world should not stop supporting Ukraine in our fight for global freedom and democracy until we achieve victory,” says Yaryna Tylchak.

To many Canadians living on the other side of the world, the war in Ukraine might seem like a distant nightmare. “This war is a brutal reality for so many people. I want you to see their faces and read the stories of ordinary people,” says Artem Kichydzhy, “and I want you to emotionally connect with them”.

The Unissued Diploma exhibition is being held on the second floor of the Atrium, and runs until Wednesday, March 22. Read more about this project on the Unissued Diplomas website. The exhibition is accepting donations for students who stay behind and “sacrifice their time and education to work for Ukraine's freedom”.