Crouched on the edge of Taras Shevchenko park in the frontline city of Kharkiv, 19 miles (30km) from the Russian border, the city’s vast opera house resembles a battered spacecraft that has crashlanded after some epic intergalactic battle.
The Kharkiv National Academic Opera and Ballet theatre (Khnatob) building, opened in 1991 after about 25 years under construction, is the largest theatre in Ukraine. Locally, it is nicknamed “the aircraft carrier”.
