Womb
Alena Grom shows a transformation of this place. If before the mines and the makeshift coalmines had been bringing grief and misfortune, then in the conditions of constant fierce attacks they acquired a different meaning. For a long time a lot of families were forced to live in dungeons: shelters, cellars and even mines. They were arranging their mode of life here and here their existence was going by. Thus, this place is the womb, which preserved and gave a new life.
Grom Alena
Ukrainian documentary photographer Alena Grom was born in Donetsk. In April 2014 she was forced to leave her hometown due to military events in Eastern Ukraine. Since 2017 she has lived in Bucha, a town outside of Kyiv.
As a result of the full-scale invasion of Russia in February 2022, Grom and her family became refugees for the second time, but returned after the de-occupation of Bucha.
These events largely affected her artistic practice. Photography became a salvation for Alena and a way to deal with the traumatic reality of war. Since 2016 Alena Grom’s work focuses on places affected by military aggression. Her lens captures victims of the war, migrants and refugees, and war-torn Ukraine in large.
However, her photographs are not illustrations of pity or grief. Life in spite of everything is one of the main themes of the artist.
