Photoreports

Boris Mikhailov: Ukrainian Diary—a color-rich portrait of post-Soviet Ukraine—opens in London after debuting in Paris in 2022. Ukrainian Photographer Boris Mikhailov and Paris-based curator Laurie Hurwitz reflect on the decades-long artistic journey that shaped the exhibition, from the radical Kharkiv School of Photography to the transgressive Case Study series, and on creating art in the midst of Russia’s full-scale invasion.

Groot and Xerox, twin Mavic drone pilots with Ukraine’s Kara-Dag brigade, have been on the frontlines since 2022. Once in the infantry, they now operate in the Kupiansk direction, flying just two kilometers from intensifying fighting.

Once the beating industrial heart of Donbas, Kramatorsk now beats for survival. During World War II, its factories forged weapons to fight Nazi Germany. That same industrial foundation made Kramatorsk a strategic target again during Russia’s 2014 and 2022 invasions. It’s one of the last major cities before the front line.

The seaside festival opened without the sea—in Kyiv instead of Odesa—with a program stretching from choreography to the front line, for a public that needs a breather as much as the truth.

Where vehicles once drove freely, FPV drones now hunt day and night. Accessing the zero line for journalists has become almost impossible, casualty evacuations are perilous, and a new Russian drone unit called Rubicon has made life deadlier than ever.

Glyadyelov’s new retrospective spans 35 years of Ukraine’s momentous history. But it is in the quiet, lived moments—the exhaled breath of a city under fire—that his photographs truly resonate.