Stolen Spring

• Prize
  Gold in People/Portrait, Gold in Portfolio/Fine Art, 1st Place winner in Portfolio
• Jury Top 5 Selection

  Susan Spiritus

• Photographer
  Alena Grom

I live in Bucha and work in Irpin. After the Russian occupation, these cities were destroyed. The military landscape has become my daily reality. I photograph women who suffered from Russian aggression, inspired by Polish photographer Michael Nash’s images of Warsaw’s ruins in WWII. Spring passed unnoticed during the occupation; people lost homes, loved ones, and a part of their lives. IDPs from Donbass and Crimea face a second tragic spring. Each photo reflects personal tragedy but also hope that Ukraine will rise from the ruins.

Ukrainian artist and documentary photographer Alena Grom was born in Donetsk. In April 2014, she was forced to leave her hometown due to the conflict in Eastern Ukraine. Since 2017, she has lived in Bucha near Kyiv. After Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022, Grom and her family became refugees twice but returned after Bucha was de-occupied. Her experiences deeply influence her work, which captures the resilience of life amid war, focusing on victims, migrants, and refugees, at the intersection of social reporting and conceptual photography.