On January 16, a photo exhibition "Together Unbreakable" dedicated to the Ukrainian resistance will open in Kherson. Civilians and soldiers resisting the Russian invasion are in focus.
This is the first exhibition in Ukraine organized by the Ukrainian Warchive, a project that archives images documenting life in the country during the full-scale invasion, raises financial support for Ukrainian photographers and organizes war-related photo exhibitions in Europe and other parts of the world.
The exhibition will be held inside the Kherson railway station. In the same room there is a "point of invincibility", so the organizers hope that the audience of the exhibition will be both travelers and Kherson residents who will come to the station to warm up and charge gadgets.
Currently, no more than a third of the population remains in the city. Kherson residents live under constant shelling. Sometimes the number of attacks reaches thirty per day. Russian shells hit infrastructure facilities, markets, hospitals, residential buildings and private houses. One strike in the city center on December 24, Christmas morning, killed eleven people.
"Discussing the content and the very idea of the exhibition caused controversy in the team. On the one hand, knowing that the residents of Kherson see all the horrors of war every day with their own eyes, we deliberately refused to show too heavy photos at the exhibition. On the other hand, we tried not to distort the reality, — says Yevhen Safonov, co-founder of the Ukrainian Warchive and organizer of the exhibition, — The main idea of the exhibition "Together - Unbreakable" is the desire to support Kherson residents, to show them solidarity and to affirm their faith in victory."
Among the photographers participating in the exhibition are Anastasia Vlasova, Arseniy Gerasymenko, Yevhen Maloletka, Katya Moskalyuk, Maks Levin, Oleksiy Furman, Sasha Maslov, Serhiy Hudak, Timothy Fadek, Yurko Dyachyshyn.
The organizers also hope to continue the project: visitors of the exhibition will be able to share their own photos about life in Kherson during the occupation - the best photos will become part of the new exhibition.
Partners of the exhibition: Mystetskyi Arsenal, Ukrainian Railways.
The Photo Archive of the War in Ukraine (WArchive) has announced the winners of the first wave of microgrants for photo projects related to the coverage of life during the Russian war against Ukraine. The winners receive 800 euros and have to make a photo story or a series of 15-45 photos within 6 weeks.
In total, the WArchive team selected 10 projects by Ukrainian photographers:
Yelyzaveta Bukreeva - "Do not look at the suffering of others"
Yana Kononova - "Radiations of War"
Yulia Kochetova - "Family Portrait"
Roman Bordun - "Mirage"
Ivanna Sidach - "Protecting hope"
Oleksandr Kurmaz - "Rider on a red horse"
Sergiy Polezhaka - "Naïve Ukrainian Gardens"
Vyacheslav Ratynsky - "Signs of War"
Vladislav Musienko - "Ukrainian lyrical landscape during the war"
Olena Grom - "This crazy, crazy world".
Olena receives a scholarship of SEK 20000 from Rikstolvan Gallery, a three-month residency and an exhibition in the gallery. Microgrants for Ukrainian photographers are funded by the Swedish Institute and Hasselblad Foundation. The photos taken within the microgrants will be included in the Photo Archive of the War in Ukraine, and the photographers will become members of WArchive.
The following competitions will be held according to the following schedule:
• Second wave: January 2023.
• Third wave: March 2023.
• Fourth wave: June 2023.
Follow the updates on the website or subscribe to the newsletter to be the first to know the news from the Photo Archive of the War in Ukraine.