The City in the Rhythm of Debora Vogel

We invite you to join Inna Zolotar's city walk about Debora Vogel, a writer, philosopher, and art critic.

Debora Vogel is no longer an unknown figure in Lviv. Her name began to return to Lviv more prominently at least in the 2010s. She kept coming back in the research and artistic projects of Karolina Shymaniak, Andrij Bojarov, and others, and in translations by Yurko Prokhasko. In 2017, the Museum of Ideas hosted a multimedia exhibition dedicated to her, Puzzles of Memory, accompanied by a discussion and a musical performance. At the Space of Synagogues memorial, one can read a line from her prose collection of literary montages, Acacias Bloom.

However, despite Deborah Vogel's presence in professional discussions and conversations about artistic biographies of Lviv, her topographical absence from the city is obvious. None of the attempts to name a street, square, or any other space in the city after Deborah Vogel have been successful so far. There are also no plaques on the buildings that belonged to her family or are associated with her biography. 

However, it is not known whether Debora Vogel would have been comforted by such traditional ways of commemorating her. As one of the first women with a doctorate, a connoisseur of literature and contemporary art who saw, heard, and wrote about the city differently, her biography has little tradition, but a lot of novelty and courage. Therefore, perhaps, Debora's return to the city's spaces should be special, "Vogelian," unconventional.

During the walk, we will try to recapture our heroine's imagination in the city, look at the city through Vogel's eyes, follow her pace and rhythm, "make friends" with Debora's texts and the space, and talk about the history of this extraordinary personality, her environment, and her memory.

Duration of the walk: 2.5 hours. 

Credits

Cover Image: Kostiushka Street, Lviv, 1925-1939 / Koncern Ilustrowany Kurier Codzienny - Archiwum Ilustracji, 1-U-3539 / Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe

Gallery: Iryna Sereda