Window display

Lviv, Ukraine, 2013.

Ukrainian flags, 2015

After the Russian annexation of Crimea and incursion into east Ukraine, the Ukrainian flag has been far more prominent. Benches, walls, doors, and more or less any other paintable surface now feature the country's yellow and blue colours, commonly seen to represent the wheat fields and sky of the Ukrainian countryside.

Kharkiv, Ukraine.

2007

Carpathian mountains, Ukraine.

In the town of Skole in the Ukrainian Carpathians, 2014.

Church during restoration

Kiev, Ukraine.

Picture published in Panorama magazine

This image, of a street band performing on Kiev's Independence Square (Maidan Nezalezhnosti) was published in the August 2014 edition of Panorama, the magazine of Ukraine International Airlines.

Independence Square, Kiev, Ukraine, April 2014.

View the image on page 64, here:

Policeman.

Kiev, 2011.

Arcadia beach, Odessa, out of season.

Arcadia, Odessa, Ukraine, 2013.

Political cartoons, Kiev, Ukraine.

April 2014. Some of the political cartoons on display in Kiev, Ukraine, following the toppling of the Yanukovych regime.

Ukraine photographs published on LensCulture

Some of my photographs from Ukraine have been published on the excellent LensCulture website. See them here.

2014. A man fishes in the Danube at Vilkovo, near a statue commemorating early Lipovan settlers to the region. The Lipovans - Orthodox Old Believers - came to this corner of Ukraine after the schism of the Russian Orthodox Church, caused by the reforms of Patriarch Nikon in 1654. © Christopher Leigh

Bees and nails

Izmail, Ukraine, 2014.

A few days with the Old Believers, Ukraine.

The village of Stara Nekrasivka in Odessa region, Ukraine. Easter 2014.

Old Believers have lived in Stara Nekrasivka since the schism of the Russian Orthodox Church in 1653, caused by the reforms of Patriarch Nikon. Choosing not to adhere to the reforms, the 'Old Believers' were often persecuted by religious and state authorities, and many fled to the most remote corners of the Russian Empire.

Home to a community of the Russian Orthodox Old-Rite Church, Stara Nekrasivka is a peaceful, rural village on the Danube, less than a mile from the Romanian border.

The church tent in the pro-Russian camp, Odessa.

The picture below was taken inside the tent used for worship in the pro-Russian (or at least anti-maidan) protest camp in Odessa, Ukraine, in April 2014. The camp was destroyed in a wave of violence which erupted on 2 May 2014. The Trade Union House adjacent to the camp was set on fire, resulting in the deaths of 40 people.

The icon in the centre depicts the last Russian tsar, Nicholas II. See more pictures from Ukraine here, here and from Kiev's maidan here.