The festival will take place from 10-12 November.
Following a forced hiatus due to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Construction festival is set to host its eighth edition in Dnipro next weekend. This follows on from a Dresden event earlier this year. The festival will focus on wartime experiences and the work of initiatives participating in Ukraine’s social, cultural and physical recovery. Across the three days, there will be an educational and discussion programme alongside music, film and an art exhibition.
The music portion of the event will feature sets from Ukrainian artists including Acid Jordan, swampdogs, Igor Yalivec, iiteration, and maxandruh b2b Yuriy Bulychov. The line-up also features Chillera, Ihor Tsymbrovsky, Ivan Skoryna, Diana Derii + Ksztalt, Mlin Patz, Motoblok, Mutafory Lili, Polje and Ujif Notfound. The discussion programme will include a lecture on the underground music of the 90s in Ukraine as well as a discussion about Ukrainian niche labels.
This year, the festival is organised under the theme Ukrainian Hardcore: Learning from the Grassroots. This will be explored throughout the weekend’s proceedings. “The theme of this year’s Construction is relevant to all our activities during the full-scale war,” says Construction director Andrii Palash, who is also the head of the NGO Kultura Medialna. “We understand the importance of providing a platform for dialogue between grassroots initiatives, introducing them in Ukraine and our city, in particular. We believe it is grassroots initiatives that drive positive changes.”
“Construction itself is a grassroots initiative, just like the NGO that founded the festival, and this DIY approach lies at the heart of all our projects,” adds Kateryna Rusetska, the co-founder of Construction. “We want to talk about collectivity again, to bring together initiatives that work in different regions of Ukraine and often do not have time or space for such interaction. Dnipro, as a rear city critical for volunteer activities, is a great location for this since we have always been and remain a transit city”.
There is also a remote programme for those outside of Ukraine who want to support the project. This will feature recordings of discussions, music performances, and additional content from the festival. Find out more here.
Construction forms part of SHAPE+, the European platform for innovative music and audiovisual art co-financed by the Creative Europe programme. Head to Construction’s website for further details on their forthcoming festival in Dnipro.