"ICONS ON AMMO BOXES" is a project by Kyiv-based artists Sonya Atlantova and Oleksandr Klymenko, which is dedicated to artistic meditations on the topic of the Ukrainian-Russian war.

The main idea of the project is the transformation of death (which is symbolized by an ammo box) into life (which is traditionally symbolized by icons in Ukrainian culture).

The boxes used as a base for the icons were brought from the frontlines. That is why the icons painted on their fragments are symbolic witnesses of the war in  Ukraine.

The concept of the project combines seemingly incompatible things: the attributes of modern warfare and an ancient artistic language that dates back to the European Middle Ages. In this way, the armed conflict  is reevaluated against the background of Ukrainian and even European history of the last millennium.

It is important that the icon on the ammo box is not only a religious factor, but a cultural factor, too. Going beyond the boundaries of the religious environment, it becomes open to anyone both in Ukraine and beyond: in Europe and America.

The exhibition of icons painted on ammo boxes brought from the combat zone was shown in the European Parliament, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, the Office of the President of Ukraine, the House of the Government of Ukraine, the Lithuanian Seimas, the Kyiv City Council, Sofia Kyiv, the Embassy of the Republic of Lithuania, the EU Representation in Ukraine, in such cities as, Antwerp, Basel, Bern, Berlin, Bonn, Boston, Brussels, Bucharest, Washington, Winnipeg, Warsaw, Vienna, Vilnius, Cologne, Karlsruhe, Chur, Klaipeda, London, Los Angeles, Lublin, Miami, Milan, Montreal, Munich, Nuremberg, New York, Oxford, Ottawa, Paris, Prague, Poznań, Rome, Sofia, Toronto, Trier, Zurich, Chicago, Philadelphia, Frankfurt am Main, Iasi etc (21 countries, 112 cities, 197 locations).

Since the spring of 2015, the project "Icons in Ammo Boxes" has been a volunteer project, supporting various humanitarian initiatives.