8 Most Interesting Exhibitions in Kyiv in September

Discover eight of Kyiv’s most interesting September exhibitions, featuring contemporary art, photography, Ukrainian history, wartime reflections, and works exploring memory, identity, and cultural heritage.

Among the most interesting exhibitions in September are a showcase of works by finalists of the world’s most renowned photography competition, World Press Photo 2026; landscapes by Anastasiia Podervianska; and the Ukraine WOW exhibition marking the 35th anniversary of the restoration of Ukraine’s independence at Kyiv’s railway station. This was reported by Vogue.ua.

“Liatoshynskyi. Reflection”

Through September 20, Ukrainian House

Ukrainian House explores the life and legacy of Borys Liatoshynskyi, the man who transformed the sound of Ukrainian classical music, continuing its focus on figures without whom Ukrainian culture is impossible to imagine.

The exhibition invites visitors to trace how Liatoshynskyi’s creative biography intertwined with the history of the 20th century, and how his personal artistic choices were connected to the fate of Ukrainian culture. The exhibition combines archival materials, manuscripts, and the composer’s personal belongings, creating a multidimensional portrait of the artist and his era.

For the first time, items from Borys Liatoshynskyi’s private study-museum will be put on display. Sensory exhibition elements play a special role in the project, including a mirrored installation, soundscapes, and audiovisual works — here, visitors will be able not only to hear the music but also to see it.

Through specially recorded interviews, Liatoshynskyi’s students, Sixtiers composers, and director Ivan Uryvskyi will share their perspectives on the composer and his legacy. Uryvskyi drew on Liatoshynskyi’s musical heritage in his production of the opera The Golden Hoop.

World Press Photo 2026

Through September 27, Dovzhenko Centre

Kyiv is hosting an exhibition of works by the finalists of the world’s most renowned photography competition, World Press Photo 2026. The exhibition features award-winning works selected by an independent jury, showcasing photojournalism and documentary photography from different regions around the world.

The event is organized by the Odesa Photo Days Festival, which is presenting the World Press Photo results in Ukraine for the third time. The team says the exhibition offers Ukrainian audiences an opportunity to discover current stories from different continents and see outstanding examples of photojournalism.

“That Day”

Through October 4, Kyiv Central Railway Station

See the Independence Flag and symbols of power spanning a thousand years, visit the president’s office through VR headsets, sing your favorite songs in a karaoke carriage, fly over the Kaniv Reservoir, and stroll through a cherry orchard — an interactive exhibition titled “That Day” is opening in Kyiv.

The project, created by the Ukraine WOW team to mark the 35th anniversary of the restoration of Ukraine’s independence, can be visited at Kyiv Central Railway Station.

“Inside Me Is a Black House”

September, Kooperativ

The project, curated by Maryna Huts, brings together eleven Ukrainian women artists whose practices explore, in different ways, the experience of the full-scale war, loss, memory, home, and the transformation of personal identity.

The project consists of a series of video interviews, with its title taken from a poem by artist Vlada Ralko from her 2020 collection Mouth and Cross.

The interview series explores themes that often remain outside public discussion but shape the contemporary experience of Ukrainian women: loneliness and abandonment, migration and the loss of home, decolonization, volunteering, motherhood, the body, and memory during wartime. Each conversation reveals a different dimension of these themes through the artists’ personal stories and creative practices.

The project features Kseniia Bilyk, Anna Buriachokova, Vasylina Vrublewska, Anna Zviahintseva, Alina Zemanova, Olha Kuziura, Yevheniia Laptii, Pavla Nikitina, Mariia Proshkovska, Mariia Stoianova, and Olha Shtein.

“FIGHT < CARE < PLAY < CONNECT”

September 4 – November 29, Khanenko Museum

An exhibition by Dutch artist Marjo van Schaik.

Marjo van Schaik is an artist, designer, curator, and researcher who lives and works between Amsterdam and Kyiv. In her practice, everyday activities such as spinning, sewing, and embroidery become ways of preserving memory, expressing emotions, and telling stories. To create her works, the artist uses raw wool from Dutch sheep, combining it with other natural materials, including hemp and bio-based dyes. Marjo actively explores the natural and material heritage of different regions of Ukraine, subtly incorporating wartime stories into her artistic, research, and social projects.

The exhibition “FIGHT < CARE < PLAY < CONNECT” is closely connected to the Khanenko Museum. The textile wall coverings in the museum’s historic interiors, which became particularly visible after the collection was secured, inspired Marjo to create several new works specifically for this project.

“HideandSeek”

Through September 27, Garage33 Gallery-Shelter, Ryzka Street

“Hide and Seek” is the first solo exhibition by Vienna- and Kyiv-based artist Margo Dubovska. The exhibition features five works made from the artist’s hair, charred wood, and fiberglass from downed drones. The exhibition’s soundscape was created by Mark Panghoud.

The exhibition takes place in an unusual gallery that renowned artist Maria Kulikovska opened a year ago in the middle of a park in Kyiv’s Syrets district.

Kulikovska describes the gallery as follows: “Garage33 Gallery-Shelter stands in the Yavir garage cooperative in working-class Syrets, on the border between the metal garage structures and the overgrown woodland park. This shelter cannot guarantee anyone’s safety: it has neither sufficient walls nor a roof capable of withstanding a direct hit during the war. It glows and illuminates its surroundings because it does not hide. A home called a shelter, yet unable to shelter, raises the question at the heart of this exhibition. What can we do with vulnerability if it cannot be eliminated?”

“LandEscape”

September 2 – October 3, Dymchuk Gallery

The exhibition features paintings and levkas works by Anastasiia Podervianska created between 2012 and 2026.

Landscape is a recurring motif in Podervianska’s practice and has taken on a poetic dimension. The artist has returned to it over many years, observing the space and continually seeking new ways to interpret a familiar image. This ongoing search for new approaches to depicting the familiar becomes both an escape from reality and a return to it.

In Podervianska’s works, landscape unfolds through composition, line, shape, and color. A road, field, body of water, sky, or horizon remains recognizable, while their relationships, scale, and rhythm change from one work to another.

“Fresh” — Exhibition by Vladyslav Shereshevskyi

Kyiv Art Gallery, September 9 – October

A new exhibition by renowned Ukrainian painter Vladyslav Shereshevskyi. The National Museum “Kyiv Art Gallery” presents landscapes, still lifes, portraits, and reflections on the war, which intersect and come together in the most unexpected variations.

“The artist’s style, the curators explain, ranges from realism, with carefully rendered objects and recognizable narratives, to surrealist paintings shaped by a postmodern vision of the world. Many of Vladyslav Shereshevskyi’s works carry echoes of the ongoing war — whether through their muted gray palette or veiled references,” the project’s curators note.