Kitchen Table by Sergei Ilnitsky

Kitchen Table

General News, first prize singles

August 26, 2014

A kitchen table in Donetsk, on 26 August, a day on which several districts of the city came under artillery fire from government troops.

Protests in February had toppled Ukrainian leader Viktor Yanukovych from power, and installed the pro-European Petro Poroshenko as president. Separatists in the largely Russian-speaking east of the country demanded greater autonomy and stronger links with Russia.

In April, rebels seized government buildings and established self-proclaimed people’s republics in the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk. Pro-Russian separatists in Donetsk later asked Moscow to deploy troops in the area and consider absorbing eastern Ukraine into Russia. Clashes between government and separatist forces over the ensuing weeks resulted in heavy casualties on both sides. Russia conducted a number of military exercises near the Ukrainian border, while Ukraine and NATO officials accused Russia of arming the rebels and invading Ukrainian territory with military units and personnel, a claim that Moscow denied.

Commissioned by: European Press Photo agency

Photo Credit: Sergei Ilmitsky

Sergei Ilnitsky is a staff photographer for European Pressphoto Agency (EPA) in Moscow since 2003.

He was born in 1974 in the small town of Mariupol, Ukraine. His passion for photography started as a child. He attended the Academy of Arts and Culture in Siberia while freelancing for newspapers and advertising agencies. Upon graduation, he worked at the regional newspaper Kuznetsky Kray. In 1995, he began as a stringer for EPA assigned to the Siberian region of Russia.

In 2001, he received first prize in Press Photo of Russia’s sport category and, one year later, Press Photo of Russia also named two of his projects the best of the year.

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