Event Description
Join us for the FREE online presentation of "13 Stories of War" by Ukrainian Warchive, featuring a detailed discussion with award-winning Ukrainian photographers Evgeniy Maloletka and Yana Kononova, and editor Emine Ziyatdinova. The event will be moderated by Ukrainian Canadian documentary filmmaker and photographer Marta Iwanek, exploring the powerful visual narratives captured during the ongoing Russian invasion on Ukraine.
About the book
Ukrainian Warchive published its first book, "13 Stories of War, " marking the second year of the full-scale Russian invasion.
The book features individual visual essays accompanied by text created by 13 Ukrainian photographers and artists, members of the Ukrainian Warchive. Their photographic testimonies go beyond conventional narratives and together with text they give readers a nuanced and personal perspective that goes beyond typical media coverage. The essays delve into themes of resistance, loss and hope and provide a vivid account of the human experience in the midst of war.
Discussion Focus
The panel will delve into the role of photography in documenting war and the personal experiences of photographers working in conflict zones. We will also discuss the impact of visual storytelling on public perception and historical memory.
About the panelists
Evgeniy Maloletka is a Ukrainian war photographer, journalist and filmmaker, who has been covering the Russo-Ukrainian war since 2014. He has also covered the Euromaidan Revolution, the protests in Belarus, the Nagorno-Karabakh war and the COVID-19 pandemic in Ukraine.
In February and March 2022, during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Associated Press staff member Mstyslav Chernov, Evgeniy Maloletka, a freelancer working for AP, and producer Vasilisa Stepanenko stayed in Mariupol, which was encircled by the Russian troops, under siege, and extensively bombed, whereas the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Defense Ministry claimed that Russia only targets military installations. Maloletka were among the few journalists international journalists in Mariupol during that period, and their photographs were extensively used by Western media to cover the situation. On 11 March they were in a hospital taking photos when they were taken out of the city with the assistance of Ukrainian soldiers. They managed to escape from Mariupol unharmed.
In 2022 his work during the siege of Mariupol has been recognized with the Knight International Journalism Award, the Visa d’or News Award and the Prix Bayeux Calvados-Normandie, World Press Photo. He has also received awards from Italy, Germany, Norway and United States. Evgeniy is part of the production team behind Mstyslav Chernov’s documentary film“20 Days in Mariupol”, which won best documentary Oscar and Best Documentary BAFTA Film Awards in 2024.
Yana Kononova
With an academic background in engineering and social sciences, culminating in a PhD in sociology, Yana Kononova transitioned to artistic practice at a later stage. She hails from Pirallahi island and the Apsheron peninsula—the region of the Caspian Sea, culturally shaped by oil and gas extraction and known for its mud volcanoes. Natural gas seeps were ignited to create eternal fires in Zoroastrian temples. Later, her family migrated to Ukraine due to the First Nagorno-Karabakh War. In 2019, Kononova won the Bird in Flight Prize in Emerging Photography, and in 2022, she was honored with the Hariban Award presented by Benrido. Currently, she is furthering her education through the Art & Curatorial Practice program at the New Center for Research & Practice (USA).
Kononova's practice centers on ecocritical investigations, delving into the historical gendering of landscapes, reframing the Romantic tropes and metaphors, and exploring techno-geographical imagination. Her work delves into ways of thinking and navigating through milieus with alien temporalities while examining the materiality inherent in the photographic medium. Using medium and large-format analog cameras, she aims to achieve the tactility she seeks in images residing on the threshold between the sensitivity of the photographic surface and the act of representation.
Emine Ziyatdinova is a Crimean Tatar documentary photographer and co-founder and director of the NGO "Ukrainian Warchive," a digital photo archive of the Russo-Ukrainian war. Born in Uzbekistan, her family was deported from Crimea in 1944 by the Stalin regime. Growing up as part of the Crimean Tatar minority in Ukraine after the collapse of the Soviet Union, she gained a firsthand understanding of the human rights issues faced by ethnic minorities and the challenges stemming from the economic and political transition in her country.
Her unique perspective places her at the intersection of documentary photography, sociology, human rights, and journalism. Emine holds MA degrees in sociology from Ivan Franko National University of Lviv and in photojournalism from Ohio University's School of Visual Communication.
From 2012 to 2017, she worked extensively in documentary photography and journalism in Ukraine before relocating to the UK. There, she has contributed her expertise to the non-profit sector, working with organizations such as the Rory Peck Trust and the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Emine's work was supported by a Fulbright Scholarship and a Magnum Foundation Emergency Fund Fellowship. Her photography projects have been showcased in exhibitions both in Ukraine and internationally.
Marta Iwanek is a Ukrainian Canadian documentary filmmaker and photographer.
Her work examines community and family through the lens of identity and memory - what do we gain from them, and what happens when that connection is lost. Her family immigrated to Canada from Poland in the late 80s. Her family are survivors of Akcija Wisla where in 1947 Ukrainians from what is now south-eastern Poland were deported and dispersed to the north and west of the country by the Polish government.
She is a three-time Canadian National Magazine Award winner and her work has also been recognized by the Canadian Journalism Foundation, Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival, POYi, the Magenta Foundation, AI-AP, News Photographers Association of Canada, National Press Photographers Association and she was a participant in the Eddie Adams Workshop in Jeffersonville, New York.
She is a graduate of the journalism program at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU), the photojournalism program at Loyalist College and holds a Master’s Degree in Photography and Society from the Royal Academy of Art (KABK) in The Hague, The Netherlands. She teaches journalism at TMU and The University of Toronto.
Co-Sponsor: St. Volodymyr Institute and the Petro Jacyk Program for the Study of Ukraine, Centre for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies at the University of Toronto