Since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24th, Bukreyeva has been living in her mother’s house. The war has changed what common things mean: her mother’s basement is now a rocket shelter. When she fled her apartment, she only took with her identification cards, her dogs and some photography equipment. She says that on the third day of sheltering in the basement, she realised that the periodicity of her days had dissolved into one long, continuous moment. So, she began to keep a journal. Her series 2402. War Diary. provides a haunting roadmap of the war’s course, tying together both image and writing.

For much of the world, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine seemingly came as a surprise. Foreign news outlets and politicians portrayed Russia’s belligerence as mere theatre. They were wrong. For her series Magma, Bukreyeva walked through Kyiv with a red filter over her flash. She says that since 2014, many Ukrainians understood the threat of invasion, but could not fully believe it. But when, in 2021, Russian troops began circling her nation’s border, and the global community turned a blind eye, she sought to capture her anxiety and fear with photography. The red stained images represent the magma that was beginning to surface as lava; the ground beneath our feet can be far less stable than we hope.

As a nonfiction photographer, Bukreyeva’s work is inextricably linked to the war and events affecting her community. She captures her life, and the war is impossible to live with. Yet, her work also celebrates joy. Dead Water and Where I Was Born capture the everyday of her country and city. Although the war has changed her relationship to this series – what she captured is under immediate and existential threat – the photos are lively and often delight in the quotidian. Not Like Us, a project she considers to be her most interesting photographic experience thus far, presents the lively communities of Ukraine’s adolescents. Although only 10 years removed from them, she notes that they see her as coming from a different era. At their age, she had plans, but they have dreams.

Having left photography behind when she started working, it was not until 2019 that she took to the medium again. In a few short years, her work has already caught the attention of several street photography festivals and prizes. She recently joined the Burn My Eyes Collective, a talented group of photographers invested in candid image making. Her work is formally striking, yet thoughtful, contemplative and often unexpected––a mix found in a shortlist of great street photographers. In our interview, it becomes clear the calibre of talent that Lisa Bukreyeva represents.