On Museum Night (May 17), we invite you to spend the evening at the Kaunas Ninth Fort Museum, where an immersive musical storytelling performance-walk and free admission to the Ninth Fort exhibitions await. In the exhibitions, silent exhibits preserving memories of the past will allow you to take a close look at the complex 20th-century history of Lithuania.

PROGRAMME

18:00 Storytelling Performance-Walk “Songs of the Partisan Women” | Milda Varnauskaitė, Ariane Pawin, Oksana Zhuravel-Ohorodnyk

19:00–23:00 Free admission to the museum exhibitions (Žemaičių plentas 75, Kaunas)

SONGS OF THE PARTISAN WOMEN

What does it mean to resist? To not give in and to maintain strength even in the most terrible moments?

“Songs of the Partisan Women” is a trilingual musical storytelling performance-walk about women combatants in Lithuania, France, and Ukraine. From yesterday until today.

In France, during the Second World War, with weapons in their hands or typewriters under their arms, carrying suitcases or producing false documents – women occupied all positions of resistance against the Nazis.

In Lithuania, from 1944, wanting to fight against the Soviet occupation, they, like men, went underground. Together with them, they went into the forest, fought, and became involved in the partisan war: working as liaisons, hiding in bunkers, and writing poems.

In Ukraine, currently, more than 60,000 women are fighting to defend their country against Russian aggression. They are doctors, teachers, journalists, politicians, artists…

The authors of the performance invite you on a trilingual musical journey: poetic and joyful, deep and powerful, painting portraits of these women of resistance from different corners of Europe and weaving a dialogue between their stories. What would these women say to each other if they could meet?

Creators of the performance: storytellers Milda Varnauskaitė and Ariane Pawin, singer Oksana Zhuravel-Ohorodnyk.

The performance was specially created for the Lithuanian Culture Season in France, and its premiere took place in September 2024 in Grenoble, France.

The tour in Lithuania is funded by the Lithuanian Council for Culture.

The performance “Songs of the Partisan Women” will take place outdoors, on the grounds of the Ninth Fort Museum in Kaunas. The meeting point will be at the Kaunas Ninth Fort Museum administration building (Žemaičių pl. 71).

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The Museum Night event at the Ninth Fort Museum in Kaunas is free of charge. Visits to the defensive wall (underground tunnels) will not be organised for event attendees.

Please note that on the 17th of May, standard admission charges will apply to exhibition visits during the museum’s regular opening hours.

This is a public event; filming and photography will take place. By participating in the event, you consent to being visible in event photographs and videos, and you are informed that these photographs and videos may be published publicly.