These photographs were taken in Ukraine during the full-scale war, but they are not about war itself. They are about what remains. What endures.
Each image carries a fragment of quiet human strength: a mother’s waiting, a surgeon’s hands, a girl writing chess moves, a village woman fixing her scarf before another long day. These are not heroes in the cinematic sense. They are people who hold the world together without asking to be noticed.
Sometimes I feel I’m photographing not events, but the invisible rhythm between them — the stillness before fear, the silence inside hope. In that silence, we hear the voice of a son gone missing. We see children learning as if nothing is broken. We see a thousand-year-old church still standing after yet another wave of destruction.
My country is full of such contradictions — unbearable and beautiful at once. I don’t try to resolve them. I simply follow them.
This series is a tribute to those who carry on: not loudly, not for show, but with a kind of everyday dignity that, I believe, defines true resilience. –Oleksandr Savruk
One of the first images I took after the full-scale invasion began.
The road felt endless, but led nowhere. The sky pressed low. We didn’t know where we were going — only that we couldn’t stay.
No shelter, no plan. Just movement, cold air, and the ache of leaving home behind. And yet, far off, a crack in the dark. A sliver of light. As if something — or someone — was still holding the horizon open. ©Oleksandr Savruk
There were moments when Kyiv fell quiet — no footsteps, no movement, just the weight of war in the air. The city recovered, but that silence left a mark. On the wall, the mural stood tall — not just art, but a signal: we’re still here.
She prepares for the ritual. He prepares for the road. They stand together for one quiet moment — then part, again, not knowing for how long. ©Oleksandr Savruk
There’s a strange routine in Kyiv now: shielding Dante himself — as if to protect him from the very circles of hell he once described. The sandbags are real. So is the fear. But so is the culture that refuses to fall. ©Oleksandr Savruk
In this village, under the shadow of war, the women come to bless their baskets at night. The men are gone — at the front — but the ancient church still glows with tradition. Even in darkness, life keeps its rhythm. ©Oleksandr Savruk
How do you explain sirens and war to a child? You don’t. You protect, you distract, you hold them close. In a world turned upside down, only a mother’s love makes the unbearable feel a little less cruel. ©Oleksandr Savruk
The world may be uncertain, but Roman’s day is not.
The cow needs guiding. The ground needs tending. Life, here, insists on continuing — one stubborn animal at a time. ©Oleksandr Savruk
This house has seen more than one war. And still, the table is set, the light comes in, and the icons remain. Sometimes you can almost hear the question echo from the walls: “Why do they keep coming for us?” This kind of harmony shouldn’t have to defend itself. Because if it disappears — so might everything that makes us human. ©Oleksandr Savruk
Only four students are in the room. One is displaced by war, the others carry its weight in quieter ways. But between them — an unspoken pact: we’re here, we’ll move forward, we’ll make it through. On the walls, portraits of those who came from this same village — people who survived their own circles of hell and somehow built something lasting.
Now it’s these children’s turn. They don’t say much. But they know: we have to. ©Oleksandr Savruk
She notes her chess moves while war rages beyond the window. It feels almost normal — and that’s the dissonance. Who protects these children? Who gives them focus, peace, a future? And yet, someone does. Quietly. Steadily. Move by move. ©Oleksandr Savruk
Neurosurgeon Andriy and his team do this again and again — hold the line between life and death with calm hands and sharp focus. They work in silence, in precision, surrounded by machines and shadows and hope. No applause. No headlines. Just another life to save. Where does his part end and God’s begin? It’s hard to say. But in this room, they seem to understand each other — and together, they keep someone’s world from collapsing. ©Oleksandr Savruk
His courage doesn’t come from orders or rank. It comes from somewhere older — carved into memory, passed through generations, rooted in faith.
He stands in shadow, but holds the light for others. This is how a future begins — even in the midst of war. ©Oleksandr Savruk
She holds on to one thing: his voice. Not in memory, but in a sentence she wrote on cardboard — “Mama, why isn’t anyone looking for me?” It came in a dream. Or maybe from somewhere deeper. She grows older too fast now. Grief does that. But she still comes, still waits, still hopes — because that’s all she has left. ©Oleksandr Savruk
Two women from the same village. Their men are at the front. One waits. The other — already lost sons, a grandson. But she stands, steady. She carries love, not bitterness. Strength, not rage. And somehow, still gives others the will to endure. Because that’s what it takes now — to hold the line at home, so the future still has a place to return to. ©Oleksandr Savruk
She no longer asks what he eats or if he’s warm enough. Those questions belong to another time. Now, when he writes “I’m fine,” she doesn’t press. She answers, “I know.” Then she goes outside, feeds the dog, and tells it, like always, “Wait by the gate. Maybe tomorrow.” ©Oleksandr Savruk
This sacred place survived what enemies thought they could bury. First in the last century, now again — the same darkness returns. But history teaches us: what is built on harmony, not hatred, is what truly lasts. ©Oleksandr Savruk
