France / Austria
Marylise Vigneau:
FRONTLINES OF DIGNITY, SHREDDED SKIES AND OTHER LOVE STORIES
Set in war-torn Ukraine, this project explores the intimate and human dimensions of the full-scale Russian invasion, tracing grief, loss, and the profound ways war alters identity, memory, and the texture of daily life.
Looking beyond the headlines and with a tender lens, it focuses on the unfolding aftermath of the war to preserve its memory. Through portraits of love—both enduring and broken it reflects the suffering and resilience of individuals impacted by war, offering a personal and social perspective on these dark times. Amidst the noise of war, it captures a longing that endures—stronger than violence—for justice, truth, love, and peace. It also aims to serve as a body of evidence.
Kyiv, April 2025. The city that keeps fighting and dancing despite the war imposed on Ukraine by Russia.
Vladislav, 28, and Valeria, 22, both from the occupied Donetsk region, met just before the full-scale invasion began. They spent only two weeks together before he was deployed. A civilian mine clearer before the war, Vlad joined the army to continue his mission—making Ukraine safer, one mine at a time. “For me, the war started eleven years ago,” he says.
They met in a café. Valeria remembers his orange cap, his charisma, and the way his eyes locked with hers, sparking an immediate connection. Vlad called it déjà vu.
On August 9, 2022, while dismantling a mine, Vlad was severely injured. After 10 days in a coma, he woke up blind, his eye sockets empty. But Valeria was there. He touched her face, trying to convince himself it was real, though his memory of her had already blurred.
At first, he tried to push her away, thinking she deserved a better life. But she stayed. In the hospital in Donetsk, he proposed with flowers and meringues.
He wears his favourite prosthetic "Tiger Eyes" with pride.
Nikita used to send messages to Anna daily from the front, always starting with "Hello, sunshine."
He was killed by a mine while fighting for Ukraine.
They met in Kyiv in October 2024. Two loneliness met each other, and the bond and trust were immediate. But their time together was sadly cut short.
Nikita was a Belarusian who once worked in Russia to escape a troubled home. When the full-scale invasion began, the war deeply upset him. It prompted him to leave Russia, hoping to start anew back in Belarus. Yet the war in Ukraine haunted him, and he created a Telegram channel to educate other Belarusians misled by propaganda. Soon Nikita found a way to join an international battalion and came to Ukraine. Fighting for Ukraine was also a fight for Belarus' freedom.
Initially, he fought on the frontline near Kharkiv before becoming a drone operator. His father, who was staunchly pro-Russia, wished for his death, calling him a traitor.
On November 30, Anna received a call from one of Nikita’s fellow soldiers. The words were simple and devastating: “Nikita 200” — military code for killed in action.
Anna wears his bulletproof jacket and shirt, carrying a bouquet of roses he had given her. As she clutched his gloves, her tears flowed. Her voice breaks as she recounts how she visits his grave with two sets of headphones, listening to the music they once loved together.
At the start of the invasion, Vania defended the Kyiv region and its airport. He witnessed the brutality and looting of Russian troops—once finding a dead soldier with stolen jewellery in his pockets.
In April 2022, while recovering from pneumonia, he met Vladislava on a dating app. After weeks of long conversations, they met in person during his short leave. They fell in love quickly and got engaged before he returned to the front near Bakhmut. He remembers the trenches, the mines, the early morning shifts to catch a phone signal, the dogs he talked to, and his fallen comrades.
There were long stretches of waiting between moments of violence. Vladislava tried not to imagine what was happening.
When their position collapsed, his unit had to retreat five km under open artillery fire. Then Vania stepped on a mine.
He remained conscious, feeling the burning pain in his neck, and knew instantly that he had gone blind. After evacuation, he woke up with a respirator, and the sound reminded him of a football stadium.
After a week of silence, Vladislava learned what had happened through his mother. She wasn’t afraid—just relieved to see that his arms and legs were intact and that he was still the man she loved. They soon married. Today, they are raising a baby boy together.
The hands of Vania and Vladislava carrying Vania's ocular prosthesis. Vladislava cares for him with great tenderness.
Kyiv, April 4, 2025. On that day, the sun shone brightly and the city breathed in the gentleness of spring. Families filled the parks, and for a moment, the war felt distant. But by late afternoon, the illusion shattered: a Russian missile struck Kryvyi Rih, 400 km away, killing 16 people — including seven children.
Maksym Martynenko, 11, was killed alongside his parents, Nataliia and Mykola, during a Russian missile strike on Palm Sunday 2025. His grandmother, 71-year-old Nadiia Krasnoshchok, is the only relative alive.
Russia conducted what's called a "double-tap" strike, launching a second rocket immediately after the first, to inflict the maximum amount of damage on first responders. Situated in northeastern Ukraine, the city lies close to the border and serves as a strategic hub for Ukrainian military operations. It sits beneath the regular flightpaths of explosive drones heading further into the country. The drone engines' harsh buzz fills the air day and night, a constant backdrop to everyday life.
In an Odesa park, a young man, drunk and staggering, plays with flowers. “I'm numb," he confessed. His restless nights spent roaming and drinking speak to the hidden wounds the war is carving into Ukraine's youth, wounds that may last for decades.
TATARIN AND ANGELIKA
Tatarin stands with his partner Angelika at the Kyiv War Museum in front of an installation that reminds him of the destroyed missiles they sometimes use as coat hangers in the trenches.
His real name is withheld for the safety of his family, who is still in Crimea.
Tatarin descends from Crimean Tatars deported to the Urals under Stalin. His grandfather survived the Holodomor, and his grandmother endured forced labour in logging before resettling in Uzbekistan, where his father was born.
After the USSR’s collapse, the family returned to their ancestral land in Crimea. His father joined the Tatar national movement. After joining anti-Russian protests in Simferopol, both were blacklisted as “terrorists.” Urged by his father, he fled alone.
In Kyiv, he met Angelika, an internally displaced woman from the occupied Donetsk region. She had fled after witnessing Russia’s bombings and brutalities. Exile brought them together. After Russia’s full-scale invasion, they faced a choice: leave for Poland and start a family or stay and resist. “If no one stops them, Russia will invade Poland too,” they thought.
On February 25, 2022, Tatarin enlisted with the Territorial Defence Forces and fought in Donetsk. He now serves as a drone operator. On rare leave, he savours moments with Angelica and hot showers—though grim updates from the front are never far.
Arseniia Terzi, dancer and model, posed on an Odesa beach for a Moldovan clothing brand. Behind her, the Black Sea shimmered with deceptive calm, shadowed by the danger of missiles fired from Russian warships.
Chocolate guns ornate with the ubiquitous "Slava Ukraïni" (Glory to Ukraine) in a confectionery shop in Odesa.
On April 19, 2025, a prisoner exchange occurred at the Belarusian-Ukrainian border . While the exchange happened at the border, families gathered at the general hospital in Chernihiv, anxiously awaiting news.
They lived in uncertainty until the final moments. This image captures the moment Marharyta received the call confirming her son Ruslan’s return. Overcome with emotion and joy, she fainted upon hearing that after three years in Russian captivity, after his capture in Mariupol, Ruslan would soon be in her arms.
In Chernihiv, a man is wrapped in a banner bearing the portrait of his son, who is being held prisoner in Russia. For the past two years, he has attended nearly every prisoner exchange, hoping for his son's release. Sadly, that day brought yet another disappointment.
Every Sunday in Kyiv, since April 2022, the Azovstal Families’ Association holds demonstrations to demand the release of Ukrainian prisoners of war captured in Mariupol. The weekly gatherings serve as a persistent reminder to the public and authorities of the ongoing plight of those still in Russian captivity.
On the poster: “21 musicians have been in Russian captivity for 3 years now”
“They are being killed while you remain silent”
“Today you are the voice of Azov”
“They stood for you, now you must stand up for them”
The license plate of this car in Sumy bears the word “Death”, in Ukrainian.
Portrait of soldier Vitalii Lykhobytsky with his daughter Kira.
In May 2023, in the trenches of Luhansk, in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, was scanning enemy lines through a thermal camera. He was wearing a helmet fitted with advanced headphones. Then, a Russian sniper fired. The bullet shattered the camera and pierced one of his eyes.
When it happened, his first thought was for his children: Will I ever see them again? And even if he did survive, he feared his injuries might frighten them.
It took nearly two years and several surgeries for his face to begin resembling what it once was. Today, Vitalii has returned to civilian life and works for a construction company, contributing to rebuilding a country still at war.
Annia, 18, studies art while living in a small student dormitory. She grew up in Zaporizhzhia, immersed in dance and theatre, and cannot recall a time before drawing was part of her life. When the full-scale invasion began, she fled the shelling and spent four months in Poland. Afterwards, she decided to move to Kyiv to pursue art studies. Her work is about displacement, the body in the time of war.
Portrait of Olena Fokova, taken in the forest near her home in Bucha. Before dawn broke on February 24th, 2022, residents of the Kyiv region awoke to the thunder of Russian artillery and missile strikes. Bucha, once a quiet suburban town was thrust into the front line of Russia’s brutal push toward the capital and later became the documented site of brutal massacre. That very morning, Olena fled to Poland with her daughter. Her husband, Serhii, drove them to the border before returning to Kyiv, intending to enlist in the army. It was the last time she saw him.
Shortly afterward, while he sat in a car parked in front of their house, their phone call was abruptly cut off—and his voice was never heard again. Neighbours later said the car remained there untouched, with no sign of blood—only that Serhii had vanished.
In October 2024, a letter arrived informing her that he was being held captive in Russia. Later that month, after a prisoner exchange, news came: Serhii was alive but had been tortured and was barely able to walk.
Olena finds solace in her work as an art therapist for adolescents with mental disabilities. She wears the shirt of her missing husband.
The aftermath of a Russian shelling in Sumy.
In Odesa, a wall is covered with political drawings—a festival of black humor and sharp inventiveness. This one portrays the conduct of Russian soldiers in Ukraine.
Between two air raid sirens, a woman sits in a Kyiv bar, her face caught in the window, the city reflected around her. A moment of normalcy among the noise of war.
Kyiv, Ukraine, April 10, 2025.
In 2008, Olga and her best friend built a small house in the Carpathian Mountains near Ivano-Frankivsk. There, she met Roman, a local with whom she formed an immediate, deep bond. They soon began living together and married. They later moved to Kyiv for work.
Sharing a love for flowers, they began growing roses and nurtured ambitious plans for their business, dreams that were abruptly interrupted when the war began.
When Roman said he wanted to enlist, Olga stood by him despite her fears. On September 5, 2022, he was killed while liberating Kherson. Olga says she is grateful that his body was recovered. A fellow soldier told her Roman had thrown himself onto a grenade, saving six lives. Olga remains deeply proud of his courage.
In Odesa, where Soviet remains grow increasingly controversial and may soon be dismantled, eras overlap as a mother and daughter dance joyfully before a monument to the heroes of the Soviet Army.
Two teenagers stand in front of a map of Ukraine, made from fabric flowers. The map, untouched by Russian annexations and invasions, reflects the borders established at the time of its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.
In Odesa, a little girl's eyes reflect the weight of wartime. She was walking by the sea with her father when I asked her to pause, look into the camera, and think about the end of the war.
