Professor Thomas Hubka, UW- Milwaukee, is offering an abroad studio entitled The Architecture of Reconciliation: Ukrainians, Poles and Jews, a Multi-Culturalism Museum in Eastern Europe. His Museum and Restoration Workshop Studio is currently scheduled for the Fall 2009 semester and represents the first steps of a continuing effort to foster ethnic education on an international scale. Last semester, a one week trip to Lviv, Ukraine for five students was sponsored by the Fulbright Program, an integral part of U.S. foreign relations. With offices in over 155 countries worldwide, the Fulbright Program is designed to encourage an exchange of knowledge, skills, ideas and mutual understanding across the globe.

This fall, Prof. Hubka hopes to take most of the studio to Ukraine for one week or more during the middle of the semester (Oct. 2009). This focused trip will concentrate on understanding complex issues of multi-cultural community life and determining how to apply that knowledge to the design of a museum/workshop sited on the outskirts of Lviv. The program outline includes the integration of historic wooden building construction with a multi-cultural education facility designed for the public. In a larger scope, the workshop will be a centerpiece of reconstruction and interpretation efforts for a destroyed Ukrainian culture, namely: historic wooden religious buildings distinct to Eastern Europe. Following the excursion, students will return to Milwaukee and apply their research in studio.  In short, this study abroad experience offers a chance to be a part of a realizable project aimed toward a vision of international community life. Having spent 15 years researching intricate issues of community life and Jewish Religious architecture, Prof. Hubka’s is offering an opportunity to think about architecture on a global scale.

Architecture in the Polish and Ukrainian regions of Eastern Europe, the studio program and site are items Prof. Hubka knows well. Detailed information about his research will be found in the assigned text for the course: Resplendent Synagogue, available in the student resource center at SARUP. Having taught versions of this studio on four occasions over 20 years, Prof. Hubka’s intimate knowledge and enthusiastic insight will guide students to Lviv and will help them to understand the contextual settings of the studio’s site, program and objective. As written in the introduction to the course text, “This synagogue could not have been constructed without long periods of peaceful coexistence.” We are again in peaceful times and this study abroad trip represents an opportunity to plant a seed of understanding through the reconstruction of historic wooden architecture in a multi-cultural context. Although America has had a relatively peaceful diverse multi-cultural history, problems of multi-cultural incompatibility is a source of major conflict world wide. Understanding the international contexts we will be facing in the professional community will become critical parts of our education; Professor Hubka’s Architecture of Reconciliation studio offers the chance to experience the sensitive cultural issues that we will increasingly encounter in our architectural careers.

More information about this studio, study abroad trip and about the initial Fulbright sponsorship can be found by downloading the course description and SARUP news release listed at the left. Detailed information can also be found by contacting Professor Thomas Hubka directly: thubka@uwm.edu