Stolpersteine (Stumbling Stones,) is an international project designed to commemorate the victims of Nazism. Its idea is to install a memorial block with a small metal plate on top in urban spaces. The plate contains information about a person who was killed by the Nazis or escaped despite persecution.

A Stumbling Stone symbolically returns a person to their home. It is placed near the last place of residence, work or study, freely chosen by the person before the persecution, arrest or deportation. Passers-by metaphorically stumble over it, stop for a moment and think about the person who used to live there.

The largest decentralised monument

The idea for the Stolpersteine project came from German artist Gunter Demnig. He installed the first stone in Cologne in 1992.Today, more than 116 thousand stones have been installed in 31 European countries. In 2017, the first stone appeared in Argentina, in 2022 – in the UK and Ireland. In Ukraine, Stolpersteine can already be found on the streets of Pereiaslav-Khmelnytskyi, Rivne and Kyiv. A Stolperschwelle (Stumbling Threshold) has been installed in Chernivtsi.

Stolpersteine in Kyiv

The project One Stone, One Life: 80 Stumbling Stones for Kyiv was launched in 2021 and was dedicated to the 80th anniversary of the Babyn Yar tragedy. The project honours the memory of people whose fate was connected to Babyn Yar, i.e. those who were killed or persecuted by the Nazi regime from 1941 to 1943. Most of them are members of the Kyiv Jewish community and their relatives.

Kyiv part of the project is not only commemorative but also educational. It involves research teams consisting of pupils, students, representatives of NGOs and other individuals. They research the biography of the person  commemorated, organise and participate in the unveilingceremony, attend and conduct educational events related to the history of Babyn Yar and its memorialisation.

Goal

The project aims to organise a daily meeting of citizens with the memory of those Kyiv residents who died or suffered from Nazi persecution during the occupation of the city. We strive to bring this memory into the urban space of Kyiv.

Organisers and partners

The project is implemented by the Ukrainian Center for Holocaust Studies at the initiative of the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in Kyiv with the support of the Kyiv City State Administration.