Postcode Ukraine
When the full-blown invasion of Ukraine happened in 2022, and I witnessed more and more of my friends, relatives, and colleagues being killed or injured, I felt compelled to stay in my adopted home and help in every way I could. This also involved setting a new challenge for my practice. I co-founded Postcode Ukraine, a charity whose goal was to symbiotically combine my documentary art practice with humanitarian aid deliveries for my adopted home. It continues my investigation into the search for an ethical role for photography. Created as part of Postcode Ukraine, my new book project, Diary of a Volunteer, Edition of One is an activist reconfiguration of both the role of the photobook and the photographer working in a war zone. It is my personal record of the work of Postcode Ukraine, as we have been making humanitarian aid trips to frontline towns for over three years. It brings together more than 100 photographs I made between 2022 and 2024 of people across Ukrainian society. As everyone across the country, myself included, is suffering from the most pernicious, sustained, traumatic stress, the book also contains not only an account of the work of other grassroots charities that Postcode Ukraine supports with small grants but also an up-to-date inventory of mental health services throughout Ukraine that I compiled. The book evolved from being a request for the West to provide quality mental health service support to a traumatised nation to an equally urgent plea to support Ukrainians in determining their own future.
Edition of One is a non-commercial book that is not available for purchase, a unique, oversized dummy that I made by hand in Kyiv and that has been circulating in the UK among academics, actors, musicians, museum directors, politicians, writers, and displaced Ukrainians since Autumn 2024. I made the book in angry response to how the story of Ukraine is being told to the West through a saturated mass of online platforms, a swamp of digital noise that makes us unable to feel or think anymore and even less able to respond. By creating a photobook as a unique handmade object that can only be read and viewed by one person at a time, I hope to more accurately communicate what is happening.
As a result of Postcode Ukraine, I hope my relationship as an author with my subjects and audiences is transformative. People and their wartime experiences are not just represented for news outlets, nor are issues tokenly addressed for a photo and art market. Ukrainians are instead co-creators, and they benefit in tangible, life-changing ways quickly and effectively from our charitable aid visits. The people I encounter and photograph in frontline towns - and the Ukrainian charities we work alongside and support through grants - often benefit from that meeting and our discussions and receive practical support such as aid and grants. I benefit, too, and beyond what I could ever have imagined. Their courage inspires me to continue, and I try to reciprocate the best way I can. It's an experiment into the potential of photography when all elements of that art world support and contribute. So far we have delivered over $500 000 of aid, much of it ourselves and under extremely dangerous circumstances.
I invite each recipient of Edition of One to live with the book for a week or more, before we arrange a courier collection at a time that is convenient. Sometimes a recipient will propose the following recipient to keep the chain going. I aim to make a kind of institutional critique of photo books and by-pass the financial expectations of photography made in active war zones by Western media.
People respond to the book in any way they wish. Some people have written me long or short emails, others have made a video, or invited me to talk. Some recipients, including the daughter of a russian spy who defected to the UK, have remained silent. (She was too overcome with emotion and guilt to say
anything, she told me). For me it is the hope of communicating through the book that is the important thing.
In July 2025, we disseminated a second incarnation of Diary of a Volunteer. The Activist Edition is 1,000 self- published copies of the book we posted for free to targeted audiences in Ukraine, Europe, and the USA. We approached those with the power to help shape public perceptions and raise awareness of the importance of giving Ukrainians a voice at this critical time. Each recipient of this edition - be she a celebrity, an ambassador, or historian - also receives my written request to join a specialised circle of supporters for Ukraine. We do not request funding or money; instead, we mean to employ people's vision and talents.
I am obscenely privileged to work with an incredible team at Postcode Ukraine; Chrissy is my co-director, Yuliia is our charity liaison manager, Valery, our accountant, and our visionary co-founders are the Bollinger family. You can find out more here:
