/ 2023 / Portraiture / Other

Defender of Bakhmut

  • Prize
    Gold in Portraiture/Other
  • Photographer
    Kate Geraghty, Australia
  • Studio
    The Sydney Morning Herald

At a medical stabilisation point in the besieged city of Bakhmut, 51 year old Ukrainian soldier Oleh Nazarov waits to be transferred to a hospital in a nearby town after sustaining head, neck and back injuries from a Russian military grenade attack on his trench. Oleh enlisted in 2015 during the Donbas war, he was badly injured in 2018. After two years of recovery Oleh went back on active duty and has not left the frontlines since. Bakhmut, Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine.