‘This Place Is Full of Ghosts’

On Feb. 24, 2022, a Russian government on the hunt for more land and more power invaded Ukraine with troops, tanks and an arsenal of missiles and heavy artillery. In the year since, Ukrainians fought and fled, leaving behind cities, hiding underground while bombs fell overhead. Australian photographer Stephen Dupont arrived in the country in late April and remembers being surprised by the silence.

“There were people around, but they were all hiding. They were all living underground in these railway stations, or they'd fled the city,” Dupont recalled in an interview.

A seasoned war photographer, Dupont had visited his fair share of nations in conflict. But there was something different about Ukraine; the word he used was “haunted.”

“This place is full of ghosts,” Dupont said.