“Light and shadow, eros and thanatos — this is all on which this devilish life stands.” Photographer Yulia Kochetova has been working at the front for almost 3 years — what she understood about the war and about herself

Photographer Yulia Kochetova met the beginning of the great war in Donbas — she thought that the main theater of operations would be there. She has been filming in the hottest spots of the front for almost three years. In 2024, she became a laureate of one of the most prestigious awards for photojournalists — World Press Photo of the Year. Yulia documents personal stories of the war: she tries to narrow the focus on one person during events that are staggering in their scale. Yulia told Babel about the most terrible photos, about friends who died, about love and death, about what she realized about herself in the project "War through the Eyes of Journalists". This is a heavily shortened and edited version of our conversation. Watch the full interview on the Babel YouTube channel.

I donʼt remember myself before the war.

I donʼt even remember myself before the Great War. But Yulia from the past — I understand that she was a good girl, but now I would not be friends with her.

I feel somewhere between civilian life and war. Because I see and feel too much for this war not to become a part of me. I am used to the fact that I spend three or four days in Kyiv. Go to the service station, go to ABRAMS or Riot Division, buy stuff. Go to “Foto v Ramci”, give films, and buy new films. To see the closest ones, and thatʼs all. I always know that I am here temporarily.

The same happens when I have performances abroad. There is another, different world. There is not even an echo of war. Many foreign colleagues asked me: "What do you think when you see that here in Hamburg people drink beer?" I say that I always remember that this is another planet. And I always go back to mine.

It is very important that Ukrainian journalists talk about this war.

We have a different depth of context. Iʼm not talking only about language. You feel differently.

For the whole world, our war is a terrible storm of sounds: artillery is working, houses are falling, people are screaming under the rubble, carrying the wounded, at the emergency department they are shouting: "Give blood!" And for the whole world it is a strong sound, but it is difficult to hear anything in it. Whereas for Ukrainian journalists, these are separate voices.

We know exactly what people are screaming under the rubble. I know exactly what a combat medic says to a wounded man in a medical evacuation car while holding his hand. And I know exactly what I have to pass, and how I have to multiply their voices.

I was very unpleasant during the first two months of the Great War.

I loudly and directly — through obscenities — told journalists from other countries what I thought about them: that they were retraumatizing my people, that they were fucking idiots, that this could not be done in any way. It really pissed me off. Then I thought: "How can you not un-der-stand this?!"

After the liberation of Bucha, I saw a stranger climb onto the equipment and take a selfie on Vokzalna Street. He was just taking a selfie in our war. And then it seemed to me that it was gory stuff. And then I realized that this energy should be put to work.

There is nothing more important than the story of one person.

Nothing is more important than narrowing your focus. Personalize this war. Because war generalizes everything. The army erases your identity. This is the idea of the army. The whole army in general is about making you forget about your individuality. And when you focus on one person, it brings us back to the point. People donʼt worry about maps and numbers of military units, people worry about people.

"When they ask me what war is, I answer — names." This is a poem by Maksym Kryvtsov, who also died in this war.

We have known each other since 2015. Once we did his exhibition, and Maksym was so embarrassed by the attention... He was a fantastic artist: his poetry, his film photographs — then I thought he was underestimated. He was underestimated during his life.

Unfortunately, Maks will not write anything more. Unfortunately, his name is now one of the names I remember during my moment of silence. But he seems to me to be the main poet of our war. Still underrated. We know how to remember only dead heroes. We are very inattentive and insensitive to the living people.

All that will remain after us — photographs, portraits and cinema.

The idea that you can live through what youʼve created is very uplifting to me. Maybe thatʼs the only reason I keep going. Because I know Iʼm temporary. We are all temporary. We all end someday. Especially when you deliberately put yourself in danger. Iʼm well aware that Iʼm not going to Disneyland, and that this could all end badly.

Iʼm very selective about what I say publicly about where Iʼve been and who Iʼve been with. Sometimes itʼs a safety question, but mostly I think about my parents, who will be watching the interview and their heart will hurt even more. And I am well aware that when I make the choice to continue documenting this war, I am hurting them. I am very grateful to my parents that they never asked me not to go to war.

I took a picture of a sunflower that a tank howitzer had driven over.

Another photo shows trenches in bloom. And for me itʼs about life that goes on. About this duality. About life and death. About light and shadow. About everything on which there is a photograph. About eros and thanatos. About everything on which this devilish life stands.

And for me, this is always a rhetorical question: will we be able to flourish after the war?

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