Heart Stamped Horse

I crossed into Ukraine at 5am, following an overnight bus ride from Minsk, Belarus. It was a balmy summers morning in Lviv, and by 7am, after a lot of tired indecision about how to reach my accommodation, I filed onto a busy commuter bus into the city. I felt someone tap me on a shoulder; passing me their cash to forward to the bus driver to pay their fair. As the bus filled up, I found myself amused by the continuous passing of money, up and down the bus, with some people requiring change from the driver, all while the bus made its way through the bustling outer ring of Lviv and into the city centre.

During three weeks of the Ukrainian summer-time, I found myself constantly surprised, charmed and often beguiled by the scenes I encountered. For a country with an active war-zone and in the process of recovering from a violent socio-political revolution with the loss of significant territory, I found it at times to be both approachable yet disorienting; friendly, often introverted and fiercely independent.

Heart Stamped Horse charts my movements in and between three prominent Ukrainian cities; Kyiv, Lviv and Odessa throughout July, 2019.