There are no humans left in the heart of the greatest nuclear disaster in history. Nature thrives on the ruins of Pripyat – a city abandoned as a result of human arrogance. Quietly, the last of the self-settlers are passing away, leaving their homes empty forever.

For many years I have been exploring and documenting Chernobyl, yet trips to the closed zone around the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant have always left me with a sense of missing something. During these short visits, one can only capture fleeting glimpses of a bygone era, live out a post-apocalyptic adventure before returning to everyday life.

Meanwhile, in the heart of the greatest nuclear disaster in history, the sun rises every morning over what was once home to 50,000 people.

Solarigraphy, a long-exposure photographic technique that uses simple pinhole cameras to record the path of the sun over extended periods, allowed me to leave a part of myself in the Zone for longer and to see it from the perspective of the trees absorbing the crumbling buildings. With those simple boxes put together on my kitchen table I was able to capture time beyond our perception of reality.

Some of my photographs were lost forever. Many cameras attracted the attention of the Chernobyl police or enthusiasts of the Zone who explore every hidden corner. Several of those placed before the outbreak of the full scale war were destroyed by the Ukrainian army clearing the area around the plant after the withdrawal of Russian forces.

Thankfully, a few of them survived this incredibly difficult time for Ukraine. The resulting photographs are a unique record of the sun’s path across the sky on February 24, 2022, the day Russian troops entered the Exclusion Zone from Belarus and began their month-long occupation of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. I recovered the images from that period thanks to humanitarian aid trips to the Chernobyl area and with the help of friends connected to the Exclusion Zone, to whom I extend my heartfelt thanks for their support.

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