Life Goes On (2017-2018)
The photographs in “Life Goes On” were taken in Donetsk Oblast, Eastern Ukraine, in towns situated mere kilometres away from the front lines. Jan Jurczak grew particularly attached to one resilient community of locals in Avdiivka, a suburb of the city of Donetsk, to which he paid frequent visits. It was Elena who rented an entire floor of flats, making rooms available to those who were homeless. This was the beginning of a support centre later created and led by her. The money for its construction came from three crowdfunding campaigns organised by Jan in 2018 and 2019, who came back to Elena a few more times, with the Polish television channel to support the campaign as well as alone, in order to continue this ongoing project and support the humanitarian effort. The war in Ukraine has been raging since 2014. One of the biggest problems is represented by the lack of psychological support for war affected people. The media has little airtime left for the conflict in Ukraine. And it has even less for stories about life during wartime.
Monika Szewczyk-Wittek
photo editor, curator, and author of texts on photography
