Today I noticed an interesting sculpture outside City Hall in Edmonton. It is called Holomodor and is a memorial to the Ukraine famine of 1933.

The sculpture is by Ludmilla Temertey and it was dedicated in 1983 to mark the 50th anniversary of the famine-genocide. The Edmonton Arts Council‘s description includes the following:

“Temertey’s sculpture symbolizes the scar on humanity left by authoritarian political regimes, and more specifically on the Ukrainian people by Josef Stalin. It was commissioned by the Canadian Ukrainian Committee to commemorate the lives lost and acknowledge a little known and poorly understood event in world history. “

Sadly, ours is another period in history in which the Ukrainian people are being subjected to authoritarian oppression. The hands depicted in the sculpture have a lot to say about both 1933 and 2023.

On the base of the artwork is inscribed, ​“Let us all stand on guard against tyranny, violence and inhumanity”.