Ukrainian and Russian memorial chairs side by side in In Flanders Fields
The museum was then sent 100. Today, two were moved, put side by side: the Russian chair and the Ukrainian one.
The Ukrainian chair was delivered in 2018 by Roman Nekoliak who did an internship at the In Flanders Fields Museum in 2017. Roman chose a simple chair from the family’s country cottage. Alexey Pronin, director of the Russia – My History – history museum in Novosibirsk, Siberia, sent a chair belonging to the Osipov family, which was badly affected in World War I and the civil war that followed.
Dimitry Soenen, alderman and chairman AGB Musea Ypres: “Both commemorative chairs symbolize the victims of these countries in the First World War. Today they also symbolize the victims of this new war: once again, chairs will be left empty. A new list of victims will grow as the violence continues. Until the guns are silent. Until humanity and reason have returned and all aggression is ended at a table of negotiations.”
With this symbolic action, the In Flanders Fields Museum “expresses its condolences to all the victims of this war and expresses its horror at the escalating violence and the military logic of war.”