2 | Alyona. Photo from the project "Stolen Spring". Ukraine, Irpen | 2022.
Stolen Spring
I live in Bucha and work in Irpin. After the Russian occupation, these cities were destroyed. The military landscape has become my reality and routine. Every day I see people who are restoring their cities, their personal lives from the ruins and looking into the future.
I created a series of photographs in a historical dialogue with images by Polish photographer Michael Nash, who captured how the photographer used a decorative backdrop to mask the ruins of Warsaw during World War II in 1945-1946.
The heroes of my photographs are women who became victims of Russian aggression.
The occupation continued in the spring, people who survived this tragic period did not notice how spring passed, how chestnuts and lilies of the valley bloomed, birds flew in. They were deprived not only of their homes, loved ones, work, health, but also part of their lives. IDPs from Donbass and Crimea have a second tragic spring. A stolen spring is a stolen life. Each photo is a personal tragedy, but it is also a life- affirming story of a survivor, a hope that Ukraine will rise from the ruins.
Alyona
The woman lives in Irpen with her mother, adult son Andriy, a cat and a shepherd dog. When hostilities began in the city, Alyona remained in Irpen. On March 5, water, electricity, communication and gas disappeared. Panic arose among the neighbors and they began to leave the city en masse. The temperature in the house reached 0 degrees, it was very cold. The family moved to a summer house, where they prepared food. During fierce shelling and bombing, they went down to the basement. Once, due to a strong explosion, the son was stunned, and the cat was wounded by shrapnel in the head. On March 27, nearby houses were bombed and neighbors were injured. Alyona decided to leave the city at any cost. The son loaded the grandmother into a wheelchair and they left the house under fire. They could not take the animals with them and were worried about this. It was necessary to make a choice either to evacuate the mother in a wheelchair, or to take the animals. Volunteers helped to evacuate through the Romaniv bridge, while they were waiting for an ambulance, there was heavy shelling. At that moment, Alyona cried, for the first time in the whole spring she allowed herself to be weak. Alyona’s house was damaged during military operations.