In February 2022, with shock and disbelief, the world witnessed the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. As the months went by and the war became entrenched, Alexandre Henry began to question the place of art within such a conflict — its role, its significance, and the impact it might have in the face of such tragedy.
After a year of fighting, the need to travel there became an undeniable necessity for him: to see, to understand, to document.

On March 9, 2023, Alexandre Henry decided to leave for Ukraine with Dutch Civilian Action, a humanitarian organization that distributes goods to civilians living near the front line. Upon his arrival, he headed east, to cities such as Izium, Kherson, and Kharkiv — areas severely affected, where bombings dictate the rhythm of everyday life.

Throughout his journeys in these high-risk regions, he observed that many families had chosen to stay, while others had returned after months of exile. By meeting them, he sought to understand the reasons that compelled them to return to their homes — often destroyed, sometimes reduced to ruins — in the heart of landscapes scarred by desolation.
The answers, both simple and deeply moving, spoke of the need to recover their bearings, their friends, their former lives. Despite the omnipresent danger, their return became an act of resistance, a way to reclaim their belonging to a land that had been taken from them. In this context of destruction, another sense of time emerged — one in which hope does not vanish, but slowly rebuilds itself from the destruction.

At the end of his mission with DCA, Alexandre Henry decided to settle in Kyiv for three months, where he had access to a studio to develop his sculptural work and continue his photographic research. Since then, he has returned to Ukraine twice, including once again along with Dutch Civilian Action.

Through these series of photographs and sculptures, Alexandre Henry seeks to reveal this notion of belonging, this will to rebuild that animates the inhabitants. How do these men and women return to the very places that once held their lives, homes reduced to rubble, landscapes forever altered?

At the heart of this senseless war, life persists. Fragile, fractured, yet still searching for ways to begin again.

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Photograph of Alexandre and Bas Spijker, founder of DCA.