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THESE PHOTOS SHOW THE CHAOS IN UKRAINE

Saturday, February 26, 2022

In today’s newsletter, we show a nation under invasion, how to avoid ‘fake’ images of Ukraine, the origins of Guernica, the view from inside old Soviet bunkers, a rescued sloth … and the painterly joys of autochrome.

PHOTOGRAPH BY ANATOLII STEPANOV, AFP/GETTY IMAGES

By David Beard, Executive Editor, Newsletters

First, let the mortar fire end.

The Ukrainian soldier in Anatolii Stepanov’s photograph (above) is waiting for that moment in eastern Ukraine, in the first days of Russia’s invasion of its democratic neighbor. The images below—and in this collection of photos from the attack—each convey a certain meaning or action that can help a viewer or reader understand what is going on.

There are limits to what an image can convey. In one image in the collection, a woman and a young girl look dazed, wary, and numb on a bus poised to leave an eastern Ukraine town. But that’s all we know, and images can lead to mistaken extrapolation. (Farther down in this newsletter, we have advice on how to spot visual “fakes” purporting to be from the invasion).

Context is critical. The Picasso masterpiece Guernica packs a wallop, and many are comparing this week’s invasion to the 1937 Nazi warplane attack of a Basque town. This newsletter includes a story outlining Guernica’s creation, so you can decide yourself.

SIPA/AP

Training: Women and men hold rifles during a military drill for civilians carried out by a veterans group in the village of Siurte in western Ukraine.

AP

Movement: A convoy of Russian armored vehicles moves along a highway in Crimea. Before the invasion began in earnest, a buildup of an estimated 100,000 Russian troops near the Ukrainian border drew condemnation, but up until the attack, Moscow had denied planning an incursion.

PHOTOGRAPH BY EMILIO MORENATTI, AP

Flight: People attempt to board buses and trains out of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on Thursday after Russia targeted cities and bases with airstrikes and shelling.

PHOTOGRAPH BY PIERRE CROM, GETTY IMAGES

War means death: The coffin of Captain Anton Olegovich Sidorov is carried to the St. Trinity Cathedral in Kyiv. The Ukrainian soldier's death, which was reported Saturday, was one of the first casualties in the escalating conflict. It was attributed to a fatal shrapnel wound amid a wave of shelling by separatists in the east. Please see our full collection of images, and read Eve Conant’s story on the tangled history of Russia and Ukraine.

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STORIES WE’RE TRACKING

Is Ukraine a modern ‘Guernica?’ How Picasso’s masterpiece came to be (Nat Geo)

Photographer reflects on her ancestral home in Ukraine (The Washington Post)

How to spot video and photo fakes in Russia’s invasion (Poynter)

The Japanese photographer who shrink-wraps entire families—and their homes (CNN)

Photo taken at the start of a Baltimore uprising became a sensation (NPR)

This week’s Nat Geo News Quiz

PHOTO OF THE DAY

PHOTOGRAPH BY JUAN ARREDONDO, @JUANARRE

Hello, world: Saved from the illegal pet trade, a baby two-toed sloth peeks out of a basket at a sanctuary in Medellín, Colombia. The baskets provide a cozy retreat, mimicking the warm embrace of a mother’s arms. “People often mistakenly think sloths are unperturbed by human handling—their faces even give the impression they’re smiling—but the animals are stressed easily, and many poached from the wild die quickly in captivity, photographer Juan Arredondo tells us. Arredondo and Natasha Daly tracked down a cartel of sloth traffickers for this Nat Geo story.

From the magazine: The dense forest where tigers and leopards thrive

HUNTING THE SMUGGLERS

IN THE SPOTLIGHT

PHOTOGRAPH BY DAVID TABAGARI

A pattern: Decades ago, the Soviet Union built deep bunkers (one, pictured above) below the capital of the present-day republic of Georgia as shelter if the Cold War ever turned hot. The Kremlin did the same thing in the deep underground subway system of Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital. When people needed shelter from war in both places, Moscow turned out to be the instigator, slicing territory away from both republics. Photographer David Tabagari went deep inside the abandoned bunkers of Tbilisi for this photo essay, adapted from Nat Geo’s Georgian edition.

SEE THE BUNKERS

IN A FEW WORDS

QUOTE

I oftentimes tell stories about people living in marginalized communities. To me, it's important to give people who don’t usually have a platform a visual voice to add to our ever-changing world.

Photographer, filmmaker, Nat Geo Explorer

LAST GLIMPSE

PHOTOGRAPH BY HANS HILDENBRAND

Like a painting: Long before Kodachrome, there was a color photography process called autochrome, which involves covering a glass plate with a thin wash of tiny potato starch grains. “One thing I like about autochromes is their ability to resemble a painting,” says Sara Manco, senior photo archivist for the National Geographic Society. She chose this photo by Hans Hildenbrand from a 1927 National Geographic story called “Hospitality of the Czechs.” Why did Sara choose this image? “This particular frame reminds me of a Vermeer painting, with the light coming in from a window to the side of the frame.”

PHOTOS, OR PAINTINGS?

This newsletter has been curated and edited by David Beard, Monica Williams, and Jen Tse. Have an idea or a link? We’d love to hear from you at [email protected].

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