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Photobooks and photo albums have long remained a niche and somewhat understated segment of Ukrainian publishing. Today, however, amidst full-scale war, visual documentation is becoming one of the most powerful tools for preserving cultural memory, making sense of the wartime experience, and capturing our identity.
This year, the 33rd Lviv International BookForum, taking place from September 10 to 13, will for the first time feature a «Photobooks» cluster, designed to popularize the genre among the general public. Overall, more than 300 events exploring the theme «The Responsibility of Literature» will take place across 27 venues at the Lviv International Literary Festival.
The history of the Publishers' Forum, as the event was originally named, began in 1994 when Lviv cultural figures, publishers, and journalists sought a response to the crisis in the book market. Today, it is a major institution and one of the largest literary festivals in Central and Eastern Europe, through which Lviv earned the status of a UNESCO City of Literature.
Photographer Valentyn Kuzan curated the festival's inaugural «Photobooks» cluster. The cluster brings together major publications on the history of Ukraine's independence, ethnographic studies, and military and veteran samizdat. It offers an intensive four-day experience for anyone interested in documentary work, visual arts, book publishing, and the ways photography records our contemporary history.
Valentyn Kuzan explains the significance of the event for today's visual community:
«It is vital to speak about the events unfolding around us. Visual language is universally accessible, and a photobook is a cohesive visual statement that, in documentary photography, speaks directly to reality. Furthermore, photography serves as a research tool, and books that actively employ it will be prominently featured here.»
The cluster platform will bring together authors, publishers, critics, and leading industry experts. Through panel discussions, lectures, and public talks, they will address key questions ranging from the demand for photobooks in Ukraine and international outreach to how photography transforms personal trauma into historical record.
A central focus of the program is reflecting on war through the lens of participants themselves: re-examining Ukrainian culture and everyday life under new realities and recording the wartime experience through photobooks and zines.
As veteran, owner of the «Zbirka» bookstore, and panel moderator Natalka Kuzmenko noted, photobooks and zines are featured at BookForum for the very first time this year. A zine (short for magazine) is a self-published, non-traditional book or booklet. The «Zbirka» bookstore runs a program for veterans and active-duty military personnel, helping them compile and print their first zine.
On September 10, the Lviv Municipal Art Center will host a panel discussion where military members and veterans will share their experiences in creating zines, taking photos, and archiving lived events. Speakers include war veterans and artists Semen Kuchvara, Anton (Psikh) Kulikov, and Nazar Pidberezhnyi.
In Natalka Kuzmenko's view, organizing photobooks from personal military experience carries therapeutic value:
«Structuring lived experience into a handmade photobook or zine helps individuals process the past, write it out, place it on a shelf, and move forward into a new chapter of life.»
The schedule also features meetings with photographers whose works have become modern classics of Ukrainian documentary art, including Oleksandr Hliadelov and Oleksandr Chekmeniov. They will share background context on their projects. Attendees will also meet military photographer Dmytro Kupriyan as well as photographers Liza Bukreieva and Serhiy Korovainyi.
Panel moderator and art historian Halyna Hleba suggests viewing the photobook as a tool of cultural policy for documenting, researching, and collectively making sense of both past and present.
«Within the Photocluster at the 33rd BookForum, I will moderate three talks exploring these questions from different angles: 'How Will We Be Remembered? Visual Representation in Periodicals and Collective Publications', 'The Country in Detail: Practices of Visual Ethnography in Photobooks', and an artist talk with Oleksandr Chekmeniov,» says Halyna.
During the panel discussion «How Will We Be Remembered? Visual Representation in Periodicals and Collective Publications», documentary photographers Danylo Pavlov and Mykhailo Palinchak will share insights alongside writer Hanna Nevidoma. The panel «The Country in Detail: Practices of Visual Ethnography in Photobooks» will feature Ukraїner publishing editor-in-chief Yevheniia Sapozhnikova, photographer Yevhen Nikiforov, and Anna Ilchenko—photographer and co-creator of the Old Khata Project.
According to Halyna Hleba, the core focus of these sessions is discovering new pathways for self-understanding through visual expression:
«For me, it is crucial to discuss how photography and visual inquiry offer new ways of understanding ourselves as a multicultural nation where diverse local experiences, memories, aesthetics, and perspectives coexist. The goal is learning to appreciate this cultural complexity as a value in itself rather than compressing it into a single narrative.»
Beyond panel discussions, photo artist and art critic Oleksandr Liapin will deliver an introductory lecture on the history, evolution, and major milestones of Ukrainian photobooks. Publishers and experts will also discuss the future of visual publishing, distribution, promotion, and commercial viability.
«We aimed to represent Ukrainian photobooks in all their diversity, focusing primarily on titles available in bookstores—since many publications are now found only in private collections. However, those rare editions will also be highlighted in Oleksandr Liapin's overview lecture,» concludes cluster curator Valentyn Kuzan.
The remaining seven clusters of the book forum offer a wide range of themes, from poetry and fiction to documentary war chronicles. A distinguished team of curators will shape these sections; notably, the History cluster is led by Vakhtang Kipiani, an officer in the "Khartiya" brigade, historian, and journalist.
The complete schedule for the «Photobooks» cluster and other BookForum events is available via this link.
The XXXIII Lviv BookForum is organized by the NGO "Publishers' Forum" with support from the Ukrainian Cultural Foundation, International Renaissance Foundation, NGO "Ukrainian-Jewish Encounter", Lviv Regional Military Administration, Lviv City Council, and other partners. Admission to all events is free. A fundraising drive supporting the 13th Brigade of the NGU "Khartiya" will run throughout the festival.
Contributors:
Researcher & Author: Yana Yevmenova
Photo Editor: Marusia Maruzhenko
Copy Editor: Yulia Futey
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