24 3 August 2019 I http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk I subscribe 0330 333 1113
CHERNOBYL OVER THE YEARS
windows. ‘What type of
aircraft is this?’ we asked.
‘Second-hand Aeroflot,’ was the
reply. Aeroflot didn’t have the best
safety reputation; a second-hand
Aeroflot jangled our nerves. ‘What
have you to drink?’ we asked. ‘One
bottle of red wine. One bottle of
white wine.’ The journalist grabbed
the bottle of red. I grabbed the
white. Neither took a glass.
Landing in London, I didn’t feel
the immediate urge to photograph
in the CEZ.
Photographer David McMillan
did. He first photographed in the
CEZ in 1994. His 22nd visit was
in November 2018, and he’s not
finished. ‘I’m still intrigued by the
place and I’ll go as long as I feel I’m
still getting new photographs. If
I can’t add anything to what I’ve
done, it will be time to stop,’ says
David. ‘The scope of Chernobyl is
broad. I haven’t found an alternative
as compelling,’ he adds. 200
photographs are published in his
poignant hardback book, Growth
and Decay: Pripyat and the
Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (Steid l
2019). ‘Until relatively recently,
when I started using a digital
camera, I used 6x7cm and 4x5in
film cameras. There were no
precautions taken to protect
the film from radiation and no
consequences from that.’
The images are mostly devoid of
people but full of presence. They’re
poetic, have beauty and depth and
light. Perhaps an echo of his early
training? ‘I trained as a painter
but I think it’s all about a person’s
sensibility – how one reacts to
the world and what one finds
significant. But then there’s also
one’s colour sense and use of the
frame and all the choices that
transform the world into a picture.
It’s probably incremental things
that make a photograph resonate.’
Luke Massey’s main reason to
photograph the CEZ was to see
how nature is reclaiming it. The
naturalist, conservationist and
photographer spent 12 days in 2016
laying camera traps and searching
for wildlife. He didn’t fail, seeing
among others, hares, moose, mice,
red deer, bees, great white egrets,
raccoon dogs, beavers, cranes,
ospreys, kestrels and most
unexpectedly, a wolf. ‘I didn’t get to
photograph it as I was clambering
across some very uneven ground on
the edge of a cooling pond when I
looked up to see my first-ever wolf
exploding from the reeds below me
and running into the forest. Pretty
takepictures.Justwatched.I
wantedtoseeatleastsomelife.
Evenif it wasjusttourists.’Andrey,
whocanassembleanAK-47with
hiseyesclosed,a legacyofthe
Communistregimehehates,
hasreturnedfiveorsixtimesto
photographhisreportage,‘Visitors’.
Heonlytravelsfora dayorsoata
timeashealthdoesn’tallowany
longer.Thesharp,crispblack&
whitephotographsshowpeopleAbove:Radiation
levelsvaryacross
thearea,with
somevillages
almostcomplete
no-gozonesepic to not only see a wolf, but in
the CEZ too!’ You could edit Luke’s
photographs to make the CEZ
appear a wild Eden. His images
of the rare and endangered
Przewalski’s horse, now thriving in
the area, are divine. ‘My work was
to show it for what it is – not what
has been written about it, of mutant
animals – where wildlife is thriving
without the interference of humans.’
It was human error that
contributed to the disaster and
human interference is returning.
Ukrainian photographer Andrey
Lomakin was born in 1974 and
raised in Pripyat. On 26 April 1986,
he went to school as usual. ‘My
family survived but it affected our
health. My mum, sister and I were
evacuated on 27 April. Dad stayed
in Pripyat – he worked at the
Chernobyl nuclear power plant as
shift manager of one of the reactors.’
For Andrey, it’s all about the people.
‘I cannot imagine Pripyat without
people. On the first trip I could not© LUKE MASSEY
© DAVID MCMILL AN