Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 and while the world paid attention for a few weeks, the story was quickly overshadowed by other news. It wasn't until President Trump's infamous phone call with President Zelensky that Ukraine made headlines again, despite a bitter war with Russia that had been raging for years. And now that the impeachment trial has ended, coverage of the conflict has disappeared, yet the war has continued to impact millions of people.
Ukraine: Losing Homeland attempts to humanize the Ukrainian conflict by addressing the question of homeland and bringing attention to the individuals affected by the conflict rather than the American domestic politics. Those presented here include soldiers, women who volunteer to drive ambulances for the military, internally displaced families, and human rights investigators.
These portraits were photographed in Kharkiv, Ukraine, a city in eastern Ukraine that is home to hundreds of thousands of internally displaced people and families who fled the conflict in Donbass. Many of those interviewed said they believe they will never be able to return to their homes. If that is the case, then where do the borders between Russia and Ukraine truly exist? And what is the identity of a nation constantly losing its homeland? These portraits and landscapes attempt to bring the viewer’s attention to these questions and to the experiences of those directly impacted by this conflict.
Follow on Instagram
@alina.patrick