When AI Meets Conflict: Switzerland on Fire

How can we bridge the emotional gap between those living in peace and the victims of war? This talk explores this question through a powerful visual project that merges the serene landscapes of Switzerland with the devastating realities of war-torn Ukraine.

In this project, the latest AI-powered Photoshop tools were used to manipulate real images of Switzerland, merging them with war-ravaged landscapes from Ukraine. The work is based on self-conducted and publicly available interviews, personal photographs taken in liberated zones during volunteer missions, and images shared by people directly affected by the war. These visuals are combined with authentic wartime photographs from Ukraine, blurring the line between reality and artificiality, and challenging viewers to question what is real and what is constructed.

This work is not just about war; it is about perception, memory, and the power of imagery to evoke empathy and understanding in a time of global conflict.

Artist

Maksym Kolisnichenko is a Ukrainian graphic designer. In 2022, he lived in Ukraine during a particularly violent and unstable period. These experiences strongly influence his work, which often focuses on the intersections between memory and digital representation. "Switzerland on Fire" is a master thesis project developed within the Institute Digital Communication Environments (IDCE) at the FHNW University of Applied Sciences and Arts Northwestern Switzerland.