Photographer Adriana Dovha shared how she captures bright, light-filled people and moments at a time when everything around seems to be only shadows and darkness — and why the camera helps her preserve empathy and sentimentality even when it brings her extremely close to pain and grief.

Director, journalist and founder of the Ukrainian Association of Professional Photographers Mstislav Chernov became the winner of the Directors Guild of America (DGA Awards). The director received an award in the category “Outstanding Directing Achievement in Documentary Film for 2025" for the film “2000 meters to Andreevka”.

Russia continues to use cold as a weapon against Ukrainians, launching massive attacks on critical infrastructure. Due to severe damage to facilities in Kharkiv, a local state of emergency has been declared; in Kyiv, more than 1,000 buildings will remain without heating until the end of the heating season; and thermal power plants in western Ukraine have been damaged. Russian strikes continue to kill Ukrainian civilians: miners in the Dnipro region, residents of Druzhkivka, 18‑year‑olds in Zaporizhzhia, and many more injured across different regions of the country. Particularly shocking were the attack on a maternity hospital and the bloody shelling of a dog shelter in Zaporizhzhia. There were at least six attacks on fire‑rescue units and emergency workers. Russian strikes on the railway have also intensified significantly.

Many people carry stories they are still afraid to share even with their closest ones, fearing they might cause harm or pain. There are family albums with torn-out pages or faces of relatives painted over or cut out — people whose presence in a photograph could once lead to arrest or exile for the entire family. There are memories of traumatic experiences tied to the era of Soviet and National Socialist violence, memories that remain unspoken within families and are carefully preserved in silence. The public organization “After the Silence” researches topics that have long been taboo, brings ignored stories to light, and gives a voice to people who were forced into silence. For five years, the organization has been working in the fields of public history, memorial culture, and non‑formal education. Its work focuses on documenting and preserving stories that remained outside official narratives, particularly the experiences of people during periods of repression and war.

Ukrainian photographer Petro Chekali documents life during the war and also creates music, writes prose and poetry. He seeks to combine poetry with prose, metaphors with documentary work, and the roles of artist and art curator. Petro Chekali spoke about searching for his own visual language and for a kind of light that does not blind but, on the contrary, illuminates — and why, for him, to stop photographing would be the same as losing his sight.