Aliona Kardash, a photography student at Fachhochschule Dortmund, was successful in the internationally renowned "World Press Photo" competition with her work "Zuhause riecht es nach Rauch". The newly crowned 34-year-old winner in the "Long-term series Europe" category (prize money 1,000 euros) will be showing her photographs at the Dortmund Depot from Friday, April 4, 2025.
The cultural venue invites visitors to discover Aliona Kardash's documentary photography series in the "Platform 3" presentation area for young photography until Saturday, May 31, 2025. Born in Tomsk, Russia, the photographer has been living in Germany since 2019 and has been asking herself whether she still understands her homeland since the start of the war in Ukraine. What remains of home when your own country becomes a perpetrator? Who do you become when your own family suddenly feels foreign? How can you find a common language when there are no more words? These are the aspects that the prizewinner focused on in her photographic exploration.
Picture gallery
In the week after the war begins, Aliona Kardash writes a letter to her parents living in Russia, which she never sends. The longer the war lasts, the further apart their lives become. At Christmas 2022, Aliona returned for the first time to see her parents and capture the feelings that accompany them: Pain, the loss of identity and home, and love for people who believe in a different reality. The work "Home smells of smoke" is a visual diary for which she was on location three times for three to four weeks at a time. It illustrates the fading reality, which appears to be the same at first glance, but which shows deep wounds and scars when you look beneath the surface.
The exhibition on "Platform 3" is freely accessible during depot opening hours, except during events with admission in the hall.
- Where: Kulturort Depot(Opens in a new tab) , Immermannstraße 29, 44147 Dortmund
- When: Friday, April 4, until Saturday, May 31, 2025
About the person
Aliona Kardash has been a Master's student at Fachhochschule Dortmund since 2019. She previously completed her bachelor's degree in journalism at Tomsk State University in Russia. In 2017, she studied photography in the International Class at Hanover University of Applied Sciences and Arts.
She has been working as a freelance photojournalist since 2012. Her projects have been published in The Washington Post, Stern and GEO, among others. Aliona is a recipient of the STERN Scholarship 2022 and worked as a photojournalist for Stern Magazine for one year.
In her photographic practice, she often refers to her own background and looks for universal patterns in very personal stories. She explores cultural and national identity, people's connection to their past and commonalities.
Aliona Kardash currently lives in Hamburg. She is a member of the DOCKS Collective.