Lucas Barioulet: “Everything is multiplied tenfold on the pitch, starting with the emotions”
In front of the rubble of a bombed building in the town of Borodianka, north of Kiev, on April 23, 2022. LUCAS BARIOULET FOR THE WORLD
I take this photo in Borodyanka in April 2022, two months after the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This city north of Kiev, which has been occupied by Russian soldiers for almost a month, is 90% destroyed and the army has committed attacks on civilians.
When I arrive in Borodianka, I am struck by the desolation and the silence that reigns there. I see a woman walking in front of a ruined building, her purchases in her arms. She speaks Russian to me, I understand a few words: she is looking for her way in shock, lost in her own city, devastated by the fighting.
Everything has to be rebuilt. But in the absurdity of war, life goes on, that reality to which certain civilians who are the first victims of war somehow refer. Children, elderly people… These vulnerable people are still difficult and difficult to photograph, you often have to find the right distance, think about what to show. And sometimes the knowledge not to take a picture.
I work at Borodianka with Andrei, a young fixer from eastern Ukraine. His role is essential: he helps me get around, translate, make contact with the local people. He knows certain regions inside out because he grew up there. On the way from Vinnytsia, a western town that was spared from the fighting at the time, we talk, joke, listen to music. But when we arrive at the first destroyed cities, his face closes up. He turns off the music.
We listen in silence to the frightening testimonies of the residents. Gradually it’s not me asking him to stop talking to people anymore. He walks past buildings and charred houses asking what he can do to help them. It’s his country, his people, and all of that affects him differently than we do.
This is my second visit to Ukraine. I first reported on a high-intensity conflict like this when I was 25. This makes me think about our job, our commitment. Everything is multiplied tenfold on the pitch, starting with the emotions.
There is also a real information war going on on the ground between the two camps. Even as information is diverted, transformed, and exploited, it becomes imperative to show the reality of war.
Le Monde photographers recount a year of reporting on the war in Ukraine. Read more testimonials here.