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The silence of war Paolo Pellegrin’s black-and-white photos show the pain and destruction Russia’s invasion has inflicted on Ukraine over three years
Source: Meduza
Three years have passed since Russia launched its full-scale war against Ukraine. Throughout this time, some of the world’s best photojournalists have worked to document the destruction and human toll of Russia’s unrelenting assault. Among them is Italian photographer Paolo Pellegrin, a contributor to La Repubblica. Meduza is publishing a series of images he took in Ukraine in 2022–2023. His black-and-white photographs capture the silence that lingers after the deafening echoes of gunfire, explosions, and screams.
A patient at a rehabilitation center for Ukrainian soldiers suffering from PTSD in the country’s Kharkiv region. June 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A Ukrainian tank fires at Russian positions in the Donetsk region. 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
Ukraine, 2023
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A Ukrainian special forces drone operator in a frontline position. 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
Kharkiv’s Barabashovo market after being shelled by Russian forces. March 20, 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
Dmytro Plaksin holds the key to the basement dressing room that he called home before the Mariupol theater bombing. Uzhhorod, Ukraine. 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A Ukrainian refugee crosses on foot into Medyka, Poland, at the busiest pedestrian crossing on the two countries’ border. March 8, 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A World War II monument at the entrance to the city of Izyum. Kharkiv region, 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
An explosion in Kharkiv’s Saltivka district. March 31, 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
Destroyed planes at Kherson International Airport in the town of Chornobaivka. 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
The funeral of Anton Rodovenchyk, an 18-year-old Ukrainian soldier killed near Zhytomyr. Babyn, Rivne region. April 8, 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
Firefighters try to put out a fire in an industrial building shelled by Russian forces. Kharkiv. March 28, 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
Volunteers in Zaporizhzhia make traps used to disable wheeled vehicles. March 25, 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
The Chuhuiv-Izyum highway leading out of Kharkiv. March 29, 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
The village of Afanasiivka in Ukraine’s Mykolaiv region was completely flooded after the collapse of the Nova Kakhovka dam. June 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A dead man and his neighbor in a building that was shelled by Russian forces. Kharkiv, Ukraine. March 22, 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
Civilians cross a destroyed bridge in the city of Irpin. April 7, 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A morgue in Kharkiv where the bodies of those killed in Russia’s missile attack on the village of Hroza were held. The strike claimed the lives of about a third of the village’s residents as they gathered to mourn a fallen soldier. 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A Ukrainian military base in the city of Ivano-Frankivsk. March 3, 2022.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A woman kneels on the side of the road as a funeral procession for a fallen soldier passes by. Kulychkiv, Ukraine. May 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A military roadblock near Zaporizhzhia. July 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
An elderly woman boards a bus to leave the town of Kostiantynivka in Ukraine’s Donetsk region. 2023
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
Trenches in Kramatorsk in Ukraine’s Donetsk region. March 14, 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A detention center for Russian prisoners in Ukraine’s Lviv region. June 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
A Russian prisoner in a detention center in Ukraine’s Lviv region. June 30, 2023.
Paolo Pellegrin / Magnum Photos
