Photojournalism Now: Friday Round Up - 31st March, 2017

This week on Photojournalism Now: Friday Round Up - a truly wonderful photo essay from Ukrainian photographer Viktoria Sorochinski and Siberia's amazing frozen Baikal Lake, the deepest, and cleanest on earth. Plus the winners of the Australia and New Zealand Photobook of the Year Awards. 

Photo Essay:
Viktoria Sorochinski - Lands of No Return

Ukrainian photographer Viktoria Sorochinski has been working on this photo essay for close to a decade. These beautiful, poignant and at times hauntingly sorrowful portraits capture a society that has been bypassed by progress, its elderly residents impoverished and alone. This work is incredibly mature and insightful and rings with authenticity. 

Viktoria says as a child she visited her grandparents in this small village near Kiev, a time that she recalls as "filled with light and happiness." Years later she visited the village again and this time "was astonished at how lifeless and miserable it looked. There were almost exclusively elderly people in the village. They are living out their last days: neglected by the government and often abandoned by their families. Along with their traditions and their homes, they are slowly disappearing…Even though this project started as a personal journey, the more I worked on it, the more I realized that capturing and commemorating these people and places has a greater value. They are the last remaining evidence of the once-magical and vibrant culture that will soon be known only in history books”.

(C) All images Viktoria Sorochinski

Photo Essay: 

Kristina Kakeeva - Siberia's Frozen Baikal Lake

Russian photographer Kristina Kakeeva is also an engineer. She spent several days on the lake to produce these wonderful photographs. She also tells the story of how the lake came to be, which I love.

"The only river in the world that flows from the lake is Angara, all other rivers flow into the lake. There is a legend that the Father Baikal had 336 rivers—335 sons and one daughter, Angara. All of the sons flowed into Baikal to restock the water, but the daughter fell in love with Yenisei (another river in Russia) and started to take her father’s water to her lover. In response, Father Baikal threw a huge rock into his daughter and cursed her. This rock is called Shaman-Stone; it is situated in the spring head of Angara, and is considered to be the river’s beginning."

(C) All images Kristina Kakeeva

Photobook Awards:
Australian and New Zealand Photobook Awards - Winners 

Katrin Koenning and Sarker Protick are the winners of the 2016 Australian Photobook of the Year for their publication Astres Noir published by Chose Commune (France). This win adds to a list of impressive accolades including being shortlisted for Paris Photo-Aperture Foundation Photobook Awards (First Book) and the Prix Nadar. 

Over the ditch the New Zealand Photobook of the Year was shared by Simon Devitt for Rannoch and Evangeline Davis for Touchy. 

To find out more: Australia and New Zealand. These awards are sponsored by Momento Pro (Geoff and Libby) who deserve a shout-out because they really do put their heart and soul into making photobooks.