Photographers in Focus: Safe Light

In Kyiv, Ukrainian photographer Vic Bákin documents youth and queer subcultures against the scars of war for his latest photo series Epitome.

Based in Kyiv, Ukrainian photographer Vic Bákin contemplates coming-of-age against the backdrop of war, documenting youth and queer subcultures as the country undergoes its own evolution. Seeing his focus shift as the landscape of the city transforms around him, his work investigates masculinity, fragility, and belonging amid the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, carrying the weight of its context with many of his subjects now enlisted in the war.

Connecting with Bákin online, London-based visual artist Greg Bushell traveled to Kyiv to capture how the war on Ukraine has affected his practice for the short film Safe Light. Finding refuge in his makeshift darkroom, Bákin confronts unprocessed memories of his new reality for his latest photo series and book Epitome, recognizing scarred facades and the stains of conflict in the tactile imperfections of analog formats.

Shot on 16mm and Super-8 film, and scored by Ukrainian avant-garde pioneers Cukor Bila Smert' alongside artists Bryozone, Polje, and Yuri Lugovskoy, Safe Light reflects on resilience and memory in a Ukraine changing under Bákin’s lens, and the power of creativity to reclaim humanity amidst destruction.

February 24, 202