As part of the UN Youth Champions for Disarmament Training Programme, all participants were given the opportunity to create their own project to connect with other young people.
To do so, I have spent the last months conceptualising a project in which I explored, how disarmament can be addressed through a creative lens. With the support of the Youth4Disarmament team, my fellow youth champions and the training received through this initiative, I choreographed, creatively directed and took part in a dance video, exploring the artistic avenues to peacebuilding.
In July, 6 dancers joined me in Hamburg, Germany to work on the project, visualising the pain and destruction, that can come through war and violence. With this diverse group of dancers, came the opportunity to engage with the complex theme of remembrance, and how art can help us deal with traumas and fears. The dancers represent a variety of global regions, having cultural connections to Gambia, Ghana, Germany, Nigeria, Russian Federation, Ukraine and Vietnam. This allowed us to not only use dance as a means to address peace and disarmament but also as a means to work on intercultural understanding.
In midst of the St. Nikolai Mahnmal, we integrated our choreography into a significant German war memorial. The remains of the church, bombed during the Second World War, serve to remind us of how radicalisation can lead to destruction and how heavy the impact of war is. On the occasion of our filming day, we were surrounded by a special exhibition that addressed the Warsaw protests of 1944, a historical example of resistance against war and oppression.
Two statues created by Edith Breckwoldt were included in the choreography:
“The Ordeal - die Prüfung” is a sculpture dedicated to the victims of Germany's largest prisoner-of-war camp, Sandbostel. During the period of the Second World War, more than 50,000 people from various countries were killed there. The statue sits on the same bricks from which the prisoner barracks were built. The inscription on the bronze plate in front of the statue quotes the theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer: “No one in the whole world can change the truth. One can only seek it, find it and serve it. Truth is in every place.”
The “Earth Angel – Erdenengel” is inscribed with the message: “Take my hand and I will lead you back to you.” It aims to remind us that strength and knowledge are in every one of us and that reminding us of this, can lead us to togetherness and peace among the people of the world.
The message of the importance of including art in disarmament and peacebuilding was especially underlined through the music composed by Irene Huang, who won first place in the 13 - 18 age category of the Pitching Peace Youth Music Challenge. I believe that the combination of having young people express their emotions through dance, filming in a war memorial and dancing to a song about disarmament, allowed us to create a well-rounded piece of art, that grasps the heaviness of the impact of war and the lightness that comes with hope that many manage to hold on to.
We are once again going through very troubling times. I hope that this project showcases the many avenues we can take in bringing attention to the importance of the disarmament discourse.
Disclaimer: Spotlight Stories submitted by the #Youth4Disarmament community are not official publications of the United Nations. The stories provide a platform for youth to share their opinions and reflect on their experiences in the disarmament field. The views expressed are those of the author, and the publication of the Spotlight Stories does not imply an endorsement of the views expressed nor that the material is accurate or without bias.