“Under the dark clouds of war”: photo from Ukraine wins UNICEF Award of Year 2023 – photo

A photo from Ukraine has been awarded Photo of the Year by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). This was reported on the organisation's website. Polish photographer and documentary filmmaker Patryk Jaracz has been documenting the events of the war since the beginning of the full-scale invasion.

The photo shows children - five-year-old Alina and her friends - from Rivne Oblast playing outside and riding a bicycle as a black cloud of smoke rises behind them. Earlier, a massive drone attack destroyed a nearby oil depot. "This year's winning picture symbolizes the light of children's resilience and joy that breaks through the darkness of global wars, conflicts and disasters," UNICEF said.

In his photo, the artist talked about the lives and psychological traumas inflicted on Ukrainian children since February 2022.

"It's children like five-year-old Alina and her friends who give us hope and make us look forward to the future," Elke Budenbender, UNICEF Patron, said at the award ceremony in Berlin. "In the midst of bad news, we owe it to children everywhere to work together to bring good news and turn unstable situations into sustainable ones. So that children everywhere can grow up in peace and dignity." The jury members Peter-Matthias Gaede and Klaus Honnef also stressed that these photographs cannot leave anyone indifferent, especially when the world situation has become "more complex and confusing than it was when the competition began 24 years ago".

The second prize for Photo of the Year 2023 was awarded to German photographer Oliver Weiken, who covers the topic of child labour. The reportage photo shows boys in Afghanistan forced to work in coal mines in the Chinarak Mountains north of Kabul. Since the Taliban's victory, more and more families are sending their children to earn money.

"In hardly any other country in the world are children's rights, as defined by the United Nations, so far removed from being realised," UNICEF wrote.

In the holes of ChinarakPhoto: Oliver Weiken.

The third prize went to Russian photographer Natalya Saprunova for her report on the children of the indigenous Evenki people. She documented the transformation of childhood in Yakutia, Siberia.

The children from the great cold forestPhoto: Natalya Saprunova.

The exhibition of all the winning works will be on display at the Haus der Bundespressekonferenz in Berlin until the end of January 2024.

The works will then be opened to the public at the Willy Brandt House starting from 2 February 2024. UNICEF Photo of the Year Award. For 24 years, UNICEF Germany has been recognising the photographs and reports of professional photojournalists who document the lives of children around the world. In 2022, the winner was Eduardo Soteras, a photographer from Argentina, for his series of photographs of children from the Tigray region of Ethiopia.

Finding refuge in books
Photo: Eduardo Soretas.

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