The National Art Museum of Ukraine (NAMU) [Національний Художній Музей України (НХМУ)] has appealed for the preservation of the Maidan trebuchet.
The National Art Museum has been in the middle of the combat zone, and its workers ‘have been busy preserving the museum [були зайняті збереженням музею]’, staying at NAMU around the clock to protect it; but now they want to expand their collection. They are trying to write the first draft of the history of EuroMaidan. Since so much material has been destroyed in the fighting and/or recycled during the struggle, they want to save what’s left before it’s too late.
Chief Curator Yulia Lytvynets has explained that, once/as soon as (‘щойно‘/’как только‘) the ‘catapult [катапульта]’ ceases to serve a ‘protective function [охоронну функцію]’, NAMU wants to preserve the ‘valuable historic and artistic object [цінного історичного та художнього об’єкту]’.
I don’t know if there’s any discomfort about (or rejection of) such immediate ‘museumification [музеєфікації]’. People were still in Independence Square when the museum made the appeal (and they’re still there now). But obviously people are quite aware of the historical significance of their second revolution in ten years (or the second stage in their so-far-ten-year-long revolution).
And citizens have already created their own forensic display of traumatic material – the remains of the weapons with which they’ve been attacked. So I don’t think it’ll be too controversial on those grounds. Still, if it’s seen as a symbol of one faction’s actions rather than the citizens’ resistance, it may yet prove controversial.
conflict antiquities 
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