"You certainly didn't have to ask if you had the right room. The photos on the wall resembled figures you might have expected to have emerged from the brush of Edvard Munch. Yet these were photographs of one of the worst atrocities of Europe's history, the enforced famine in Ukraine in 1932-1933. Many had gathered, at Teacher's House on 24 November, to see these photographs, but more importantly some of the first paintings Ukrainians have been allowed to paint, commemorating this tragic time. The paintings were from accurate scenes of the famine, as retold by those who survived, to symbolic and often religious representations.

The evening to 'celebrated the lives and honour the deaths of those who had died in the famine', as organiser Morgan Williams described it, combined folk ballads with prayers and historical explanations. At one point, young children handed out seeds, ranging from school children to the elderly. As Williams explained, "Over the past five years, we have put together a visual representation of the Great Famine, because what happened here must never be forgotten, or be allowed to happen again.

History is may be, but the famine is only now being openly remembered: the next generation of Ukrainians will be more aware of it."

Article by Joy Keel, "What's On" Magazine, No. 41/2000, December 1-7, 2000