Ukrainian photographer Yuliia Kochetova won the World Press Photo 2024
On April 18, 2024, Yuliia Kochetova was announced among the winners of the World Press Photo 2024, a prestigious photojournalist award. Ukrainian photographer won in the Open Format category with her project “War Is Personal”.
The “War is Personal” project consists of photographs taken by Yuliia Kochetova in Ukraine amidst the full-scale Russian invasion, along with audio recordings, music, and illustrations that complement the photos.
“The photographer’s multidisciplinary presentation grounds the facts of war in her subjective experience, and simultaneously allows her to inject more emotion and symbolism than photographs might convey on their own,” noted the judges of the the World Press Photo 2024.
“I know that this photo and our flag will travel all over the world. The summer of 2022, on the edge of the Kharkiv and Donetsk region, and this “checkpoint”, and the urgent initial need to raise our flag,” commented Yuliia Kochetova on her award-winning photo with the Ukrainian flag. “No prize wins the war. But I’m gifted to have a clear feeling that I’m one of those who hold our flag. I will do it as much as I can. Honor to the killed in action, glory to the living heroes. Thank you to those, who protected me and continue to defend my right to live.”
Photo: Foundation Academy Photo Insider Community
Yuliia Kochetova is a Ukrainian photojournalist and documentary filmmaker based in Kyiv. As a freelancer, she has covered the Maidan Revolution (2013-2014), Russia’s occupation of Crimea, and Russia’s war against Ukraine since 2014. Kochetova is also a regular contributor to international media: Der Spiegel, Vice News, Zeit, Bloomberg, The Guardian, and others. In 2023, a Ukrainian photojournalist won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Continuing News Coverage: Long Form with VICE News Tonight.
This year’s recognition at World Press Photo is not the first for Ukrainian photographers: one of last year’s contest winners was Evhenii Maloletka for his The Siege of Mariupol series. The image of a pregnant woman carried on a stretcher near a bombed maternity hospital in Mariupol got the World Press Photo of the Year award.
