'A Lot of Light and Illumination Has Been Taken Away from Their Hearts'

[UPDATE: Readers have reported that this video doesn't play in other countries. You can try searching for "CBS Sunday Morning / Ukrainian refugees flee war at home." This is a common situation that works the other way too—sometimes we in the USA can't see videos from the UK or Australia. Sorry for the annoyance, though. —Ed.]

[UPDATE #2: Now I'm hearing that some people in other countries can see it. Maybe try again, or later?]

I mentioned a while back that our friend Peter Turnley, whose more lyrical prints of Paris I and perhaps you have hanging on the walls of our homes, had crossed the border into Ukraine. Here's a brief update on what he did there:

(posted by) Mike

Book of Interest this Week

Home Fires Volume II: The Present. There is of course a Volume I: The Past.  TOP reader Bruce Haley has produced documentary work relating to conflict, humanitarian crises and environmental/industrial/land use issues for 30 years. He received the Robert Capa Gold Medal for his coverage of the ethnic civil war in Burma.

This book link is a portal to Amazon.

Today at B&H Photo

Original contents copyright 2020 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Fred Haynes: "I watch 'Sunday Morning' on YouTube, partly because I can use my iPad, and I can select what stories to watch. I saw this Ukrainian refugee story, and tried to avoid it, not thinking I’d have the stomach for it. I try to avoid the news, frankly, because it’s all so disturbing. But since you posted it, and made reference to Peter Turnley, I watched it. The story was heartbreaking! As I thought it would be. Peter’s photographs were amazing. The pain being suffered by these people is hard to see, hard to handle emotionally. As expected, I cried! Just writing about it, remembering it again, it’s heart wrenching! Why do we 'humans' do this to one another? The unanswerable question."

Rip Smith: "Peter’s images are searing. His monochrome treatment recalls the horrors of 70 years ago. When will we learn? Yet for all of that, the strength of the Ukrainian people is stunning."

Peter Cooke: "Thank You, Michael, from here in Australia. The Turnley's photographs had my wife and I in tears. The verbal image of the deflated balloon is a powerful one. Thank you again."

Comments

[Malcolm Myers]

Thanks for sharing, his words are heartbreaking. The whole situation is something you normally only read about in the history of WWII, but it's on the daily news.

We have a new house that is quite big but not quite finished and, short of this war ending soon, I think we will be offering a room to a family. How could we not?

[Gavin Paterson]

Video link not available in Australia?

[Omer]

Hooray for Peter Turnley, his photography showing us the depth of this tragedy. From the images that were shown, it's obvious he is doing some extraordinary work.

[Kenneth Tanaka]

Thanks for posting this CBS clip featuring Peter's work, Mike. This is exceeding the definition of "heartbreaking".

As an aside, Peter shows some of his typically well-crafted doc work here. It's a bit of a mini-photo workshop in itself, isn't it? But, and I say this with all respect for Peter's work, I think b&w fails here. Why? Because it abstracts and romanticizes the misery as monochrome photography does with nearly all subjects. It dulls the raw immediacy. It's one thing to see terrified crying children and mothers in gray tones. But it's quite another to see the children wearing the same clothing colors that YOUR kids and grandchildren wear daily. That's the real teeth of the situation in the Ukraine; they're people living in the modern world. This could be Brooklyn or Memphis. But monochrome dulls that bite here, in my opinion, by rendering everything as historic record rather than living hell.

[Lesley T]

The video you posted isn't available in Canada, I don't know if it is the same one, but I found one here:https://www.cnn.com/videos/world/2022/03/12/photographer-turnley-lviv-train-station-refugees-natpkg-vpx.cnn

[Mitch]

Video unavailable in Canada!

[ChrisC]

Getting a “video not available in your country “ error. (Australia)

[Sherwood McLernon]

Video isn't available in Canada

[Peter]

Is there a reason why Australians cannot view this video? Are we being sanctioned now?

[V.I. Voltz]

The uploader has not made this video available in your country.

Voltz

[Eric Rose]

Can't see the video in Canada.

[Richard Parkin]

FWIW the video plays in the U.K.

[Omer]

Mike wrote : ”…pictures don't actually depend on technical quality to be "good"—maybe some of them will even be "better" because of the effects of aging.”

I’m counting on that!

[Grant]

A VPN on your computer will allow you to pretend that you are in a country that can view the video. The simplest way for Windows and Linux users is to install the Opera browser. It includes a VPN and it's activated with just a few clicks.
Although Peter and his photos are only part of the video, they effectively show the despair that these people are going through.

[Graham]

Thank you for that.