Minnesmärken (Memorials)

What role does art play for our collective memory? And how can art function as a bridge between the present and the era that no living person has experienced, but which we must never forget? During the academic year 2022–2023, a total of more than a thousand students from 7th grade in Malmö and 9th grade in the Skåne region have sketched their own memorials inspired by Malmö Konsthall’s exhibition “A Glimpse of Ceija Stojka”.

With a starting point in Ceija Stojka’s exhibition

In the spring of 2021, over 140 works by the Roma artist and Holocaust survivor Ceija Stojka (1933–2013) were exhibited at Malmö Konsthall. Due to restrictions related to the pandemic, school classes could not be invited to the exhibition, and in the fall of 2022, the konsthall therefore opened an exhibition featuring six works by Stojka, titled “A Glimpse of Ceija Stojka”. In-depth guided tours and workshops were offered to school classes, and a total of over a thousand students from 44 classes participated during the academic year 2022–2023.To the mini exhibition “A Glimpse of Ceija Stojka”.

Contemporary memorials

Individually or in groups, the students were to come up with their own memorial, dedicated to something of their own choosing. Some examples included memorials for women who have experienced violence and oppression, school shootings and their victims, environmental destruction and climate change, the Black Lives Matter movement, victims of wars, both in Ukraine and in the students’ own countries or their parents’ countries.

Themes like violence, oppression and mental health issues

At Malmö Konsthall, a selection of the works created during the year is now being exhibited in the Workshop.