FOTODOKS
Festival for contemporary
documentary photography
FOTODOKS
Festival for contemporary documentary photography

Anya Tsaruk

I Hope Your Family is Safe, 2023 – ongoing

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 marked a dramatic escalation of the war that had begun in 2014. Two years ago, Ukrainian photographer Anya Tsaruk returned to her homeland after nine years living abroad to document the everyday lives of her family and friends for the photo series I Hope Your Family is Safe. The title echoes a phrase often expressed to her by foreigners – hopeful, heartfelt, yet unsettling. Through her photographs, Tsaruk shapes a quiet, nuanced visual narrative that brings human connections into focus in a deeply empathetic manner. Her images draw our attention to what becomes most precious when life is lived under threat: its sacred ordinariness for those who call Ukraine home. In portraying moments of solitude and connection, the project resists the imagined ‘othering’ of people whose lives have been deeply affected by war. It invites us to ground our empathy not in pity but in a recognition of universal human bonds, values, fears and hopes.

 

Website:

https://anyatsaruk.com/

Anya Tsaruk

I Hope Your Family is Safe, 2023 – ongoing

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 marked a dramatic escalation of the war that had begun in 2014. Two years ago, Ukrainian photographer Anya Tsaruk returned to her homeland after nine years living abroad to document the everyday lives of her family and friends for the photo series I Hope Your Family is Safe. The title echoes a phrase often expressed to her by foreigners – hopeful, heartfelt, yet unsettling. Through her photographs, Tsaruk shapes a quiet, nuanced visual narrative that brings human connections into focus in a deeply empathetic manner. Her images draw our attention to what becomes most precious when life is lived under threat: its sacred ordinariness for those who call Ukraine home. In portraying moments of solitude and connection, the project resists the imagined ‘othering’ of people whose lives have been deeply affected by war. It invites us to ground our empathy not in pity but in a recognition of universal human bonds, values, fears and hopes.

 

Website:

https://anyatsaruk.com/