Bohdan Shumylovych
historian and art historian, researcher, coordinator of exhibitions and Urban Video collection (2008-2011), researcher and head of the Urban Media Archive (2011-2019), head of the Public history projects (2020 – 2021), head of the Educational projects (2022).
Bohdan Shumylovych obtained a master’s degree in modern history from the Central European University (Budapest, Hungary, 2004-2005), a diploma in art history from the L’viv Academy of Arts (Ukraine, 1993-1999). He was a fellow of several grant programs and worked with the archive of the Faculty of Visual Arts at George Washington University, Washington (USA) and the archive of Open Society Institute (www.osaarchivum.org), in Budapest. In 2020 he has received a PhD from the European University Institute in Florence.
At the Center for Urban History (L’viv) he coordinates the Public history program, gives lectures, participates in the development of the Centre for Urban History’s thematic exhibitions, and carries out research.
The main focus of his work is media history in East Central Europe and the Soviet Union, as well as media arts, visual studies, urban spatial practices, and urban creativity.
Related sources:
Concerning the Intensification of the Fight Against Persons Who Avoid Socially Useful Work, statement 1961
The Soviet authorities not only motivated workers to labor feats, but also punished those who refused selfless work for the benefit of the motherland. For example, in February 1948, a decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR was signed "On the eviction from the Ukrainian SSR of persons who maliciously avoid work in agriculture and lead an anti-social, parasitic lifestyle." Similar approaches were approved by the resolution of the RSFSR from 1961, which encouraged to identify (that is,to report), punish and even imprison people who chose a non-socialist way of life. The document shows that despite official claims about the advantages of communist production and socialist competition, many people...
The Movement of Collectives and Shock Workers Brigades of Communist Labour, article
This article is part of the Soviet Encyclopedia and was written by Semion Romanovych (in life Srul Rakhmilevich) Gershberg (1908-1984). He was a researcher of Soviet history who specialized in the topic of "labor strikers". From 1931 to 1949, Gershberg worked for the Pravda newspaper and was fired during the 1949 anti-Semitic campaign in the USSR. Since 1949, he worked at the publishing house "Soviet Encyclopedia", where he held the position of deputy head of the editorial board. In 1961, he published the book "Movement of Collectives and Strikers of Communist Labor" and based on this research created the same article for the Great Soviet Encyclopedia (third edition 1969-1978, which consists of 30...
Members of the Communist Labor Brigade and the presentation of Komsomol tickets at the Mariupol Heavy Machinery Plant
The photo shows the moment of the ceremonial presentation of a Komsomol ticket to an employee of the Mariupol heavy engineering plant. In addition to the ticket, a party or Komsomol functionary hands an unknown woman a pennant, which may indicate that this new Komsomol member has already achived significant results in the performance of the party’s labor tasks. Most likely, she is a representative of the leaders of the plant, and it was important for the Soviet system that the leaders of the production were part of the Komsomol-party asset. If we follow the name of this source, then the young worker is part of the “communist labor brigade”, which was an...
“Where Are We Headed?”, film 1989
Where Are We Headed? reflects the ideas of Perestroika. It shows the increasing concern among the grassroots movements over the environmental issues. The film was created at the amateur “Kadr” film studio in Mariupol, Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. It addresses the most pressing environmental problems in Mariupol (in 1984-1989 called Zhdanov, after the Soviet revolutionary, politician, and accomplice in the Great Purge of 1937-1938, Andrei Zhdanov). The filmmakers employed various narrative methods: voice-over narration; shots of city scenes and landscapes; filming near industrial enterprises; landscapes and close-ups of rivers and coastal areas; overlaying visuals with a list of harmful chemicals; and excerpts from expert commentary (including the chairwoman of the City...
“Screen of Pryazovia” (Pryazovskyi Ekran) № 1, 1969
This newsreel is a valuable source on the history of the development of the Mariupol industry. It was produced by the city club of film amateurs. Following the example of the Ukrkinochronika studio in the capital city which published the main newsreels in the republic, the authors of this piece created a short film report with 4 stories that tell about the deputies, the introduction of innovations in blast furnace steelmaking, about the winners of the socialist competition, and about the meeting of workers with a Soviet cosmonaut.
Collective of Communist Labor at Shoe Factory, 1960
Television news of the Lviv Television Studio followed the operators of Ukrkinochronika who chose shoe factory No. 3 as a model enterprise of the city’s light industry. The television camera shows to the audience Kateryna Lysak, an exemplary employee of the enterprise that was granted a status of a “communist labor enterprise”. At such enterprises, the example of the pioneers was to be followed by other workers, and a television clip told the people of Lviv about leaders of production and how the shoe factory was developing.
Song of the Communist Labor Brigades
"Song of Communist Labor Brigades" was written in 1956 by the composer Arkady Filipenko (1912-1983), who, in addition to academic music, wrote works for operettas and films. The verses to the song were written by another outstanding figure of Soviet culture of the Ukrainian SSR, Oleksa Novitsky (1914-1992), who was a military correspondent during the war, and later became a Shevchenko scholar. Both authors had the "right" biographies for writing the anthem of the communist labor brigades, which was performed at official events in the Ukrainian SSR, and was also published in large numbers for performance by professional and amateur groups. The song has a solemn mood and asserts that the communist labor...
The founders of the Soviet Union believed that the basis for new forms of labor was to be an amateur initiative and talents, of which the people have an endless source, managed by “nationwide accounting and control”. The method of introducing new forms of industry management was the widest propaganda of labor achievements. Soviet ideologists habitually cited Lenin who believed that labor could change a human being under socialism and advised how to organize socialist competition. This module by historian Bohdan Shumylovych is devoted to the topic of labor in communist propaganda, using the example of the 1960s.
У 1950–1960-х роках на підприємствах Радянської України поширилися практики, скеровані на удосконалення праці. Двигуном цього процесу були так звані передовики – учасники руху трудящих СРСР за комуністичне ставлення до праці та за виховання людини комуністичного суспільства.
The late nineteenth and twentieth centuries entered history with rapid changes, such as political, economic, demographic, social, ideological, and cultural. The course makes an attempt to look at how modernization has changed men and women and their gender roles and responsibilities, and what new meanings it gave to the once-established norms. It also tackles the question of how the modernity enshrined approaches affect our present. The topics presented in this course refer to different humanitarian disciplines (women's history, cultural studies, sociology, literary studies, art studies) and to different historical contexts. They rely on a variety of sources and methods focusing on a person in their gender-based roles and interdependencies. The course will present...
This cource was born as an attempt to reflect on certain urban phenomena in the 20th century from a transnational perspective. The lectures will tell about the phenomenon of urban scraps and urban fragments in the legacy of modernist painters. We will learn about how the media could be transit phenomena and how art forms could ruin the strong ideological frames. We are going to see how the Lviv Avant-Garde was building, how the street was becoming a source for inspiration of artists of Lviv Modernism, and how street art has been important political self-expression also today.
The course is aimed at both encompassing the theoretical aspects of the visual turn in the 20th century and demonstrating practical instruments for analyzing static and dynamic images. It studies the key issues of the visual culture sphere and orients students in the topic of the social role images and visuality play.