My great-grandmother Anastasia with her husband, my great-grandfather Mykola before deportation, v. Sviat, Poland, 1936. She had no flowers on that day and so I added them to her.
The bedroom of my grandmother Agafiya, autumn of the 2020.
My father kneeling and me at the age of my father at that time (he's dandling me in his arms), winter 1967 – autumn 2002. In the photo are my relatives after 21 years had passed since the deportation. The new place greeted them with the forsaken Polish houses, and they started building one of their own in Obolonnya village, Ivano-Frankivsk region.
My mother and me. She least enjoyed treading new paths upon heavy snowfalls, and dreamt of a new house. The old clay hut, which housed Poles prior to us, was a heavy view. Obolonnya village, Ivano-Frankivsk region.
My mother, sisters, and the layout of a new house, where no one lives to this day still. Parents continue to live in the old one. Obolonnya village, Ivano-Frankivsk region.
Grandmother Agafiya, wearing the same white suit as my mother in the photo below. 2024, 2002, and 1940 (photo taken in Poland, before deportation).
Blue is like a talisman of our house. Hundreds of meters of fence had to be repainted every time the whole family saw it turn black. "Why blue?" I used to ask my parents. "There was already too much green around," they answered. In summer, our house near the forest was literally swallowed by nature. In the photo: my mother, sister and I. 2001 and 2003.
Backyard. Spring 2003, autumn 2020. Farming was the only way to survive in a new place. The field is still very important to my family. Obolonnya village, Ivano-Frankivsk region.
There is no beauty to be found
It’s not a granted thing.
There’s but a soul alive and pure,
A beating heart within.
Grandmother Agafiya. Almost every photo she sent to her friends would be marked with similar lines. During the raids in Zakerzonnia she remembers having lost a boot, along with another accident in her childhood, which made her almost blind in one eye, so she refused to be photographed since, 1957. I decided to decorate her body with flowers to show her beauty through them.
Passport photo. Grandmother Agafiya, a true beauty. 1961.
My grandmother’s cousin died young because of a broken heart. Pictured on the right are my mother and sisters. The apple-picking season. Everyone is together now.
My great-great-grandmother Mokrina. Our family memories are so fragile and fade year by year, my great-great-grandmother is so close to be forgotten forever. Obolonnya village, Ivano-Frankivsk region, Nov. 20, 2020.
Let your relatives come out of the old photo albums and breath in some autumn air before a long and cold winter. Only in this way we can all meet together again. Obolonnya village, Ivano-Frankivsk region, Nov. 20, 2020.
I'm drinking tea with a projection of my sister at the courtyard. It's the only way I can see my sister now. After the full-scale invasion she immigrated to Great Britain. My great-grandmother Anastasiia sits on the right with her sister Maryna. Obolonnya village, Ivano-Frankivsk region, 1980 and September 8, 2022.
