Fire and Ice in Kiev: Ross McDonnell on Ukraine’s Front Line

2 minute read

A photographer friend in Kiev told me during a rare moment of respite this past week that this was a revolution that would be remembered in still images. It struck me as a particularly appropriate thing to say during a succession of days that saw Ukrainian demonstrators attack police lines on Hrushevskoho Street, the site where earlier in the week two protesters had lost their lives — shot by government forces using live rounds.

The scene itself was a rich visual allegory: the protesters, their blood boiling at the death of their comrades and the seeming impunity of President Yanukovich’s Berkut special police, attacked the front lines with Molotov cocktails, built huge walls of flame from stockpiles of tires and gasoline and rioted through the night as the fires burned so intensely they threatened to turn ornate building facades along the street to ashes.

The police, perhaps shamed by their earlier actions and their haste to use lethal force, were cold in their reaction to the attacks. Ice cold, in fact. They aimed high-powered fire hoses in the direction of the demonstrators and seemed to relish the result when the extreme cold turned the landscape to a glass-like lake of ice.

The stage was set, perfectly balanced by two polarized forces: fire and ice; anti-government upstarts versus the machinery of the state. It was a scene that will live on in the memory of those who witnessed it, a brief moment of conflict transformed into a painterly tapestry.

By night, as the rioters filed towards the front line through layers of flames to stoke the inferno with more tires and gasoline, it was a tableau worthy of Hieronymus Bosch. By day, in the blue half-light of the Eastern winter, it was like a scene from the Second World War, as the exhausted protesters — in Soviet-era army helmets and military surplus — their faces blackened by smoke, carried on.

I wonder now, with the benefit of hindsight, whether the week’s images, that deluge of countless photographs, truly represents the political crisis in the Ukraine, or merely illustrates a scenario perfectly tailored to the power of the still image.


Ross McDonnell is a photographer and filmmaker born in Dublin. LightBox has previously featured McDonnell’s work on the ‘Auto Defensa’ anti-criminal uprisings in Mexico, Irish public housing projects and Enrique Metinides.


Ukraine Protests
Jan. 25, 2014. Hrushevskoho Street in central Kiev is turned into a hellish inferno as demonstrators voice their dissent after two protesters were shot dead at the same site during the week. Rioting continued through the night and into Saturday with organized and orchestrated attacks against the police but no further injuries.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 24, 2014. A protestor holds a handmade shield as protection during rioting. Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 24, 2014. A tense standoff between protesters and police in the calm before rioting began on Friday evening. Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 24, 2014. Rioters throw rocks and Molotov cocktails at riot police on the front lines. Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 24, 2014. After a night of intense rioting on Kiev's Hrushevskoho Street, protesters try to venture forward to the front line using homemade shields to launch Molotov cocktails and rocks at the government forces.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 24, 2014. Fist pumping, shouting slogans of encouragement and the ubiquitous drum beat fuel prolonged rioting against Ukrainian police forces. A protester moves back towards the front line, re-entering the fray.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 24, 2014. An anti-government demonstrator crouches behind a charred bus at the front line on Hrusehvskoho Street in Ukraine as rioters attacked police throughout Friday night into Saturday.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 25, 2014. Rioting was organized and orchestrated. Protesters built tire walls that were restocked with gasoline. Amid intense heat protesters moved forward behind homemade shields to put more fuel on the blaze.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 25, 2014. Chanting nationalist slogans and gesturing to the police, a demonstrator stands atop a charred bus during intense rioting in central Kiev that went throughout Friday night.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 25, 2014. Riot police keep a fire hose aimed at protesters continuously during rioting on Hrushevskoho Street in central Kiev. Freezing temperatures creates a dramatic landscape of fire and ice.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 25, 2014. After a night of intense rioting on Kiev's Hrushevskoho Street, protesters change their angle of attack against police, using homemade shields to move within range of riot police to throw rocks and Molotov cocktails.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 25, 2014. Protestors reinforce barricades near the Dynamo Kiev football stadium by stoking fires as an additional line of defense. Police respond with a fire hose that freezes protesters. Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 25, 2014. Orthodox priests and their congregation say prayers for peace amid rioting between anti-government demonstrators and police in Kiev near the Dynamo Kiev Statium on Hrushevskoho Street Street. Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 25, 2014. Cossaks, a group of predominantly East Slavic people who became known as members of democratic, semi-military communities during Soviet times, have become icons of the Euro Maidan or Independence Square and the Ukrainian protest movement.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 25, 2014. On Saturday night protesters stormed Ukraine House, Kiev's convention center where approximately a hundred riot police were ensconsed inside. The protesters trapped the helpless police inside leading to a standoff between angry protesters. Violence was largely avoided however.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests - Body of martyr Mikhail Zhivnevsky paraded thr
Jan. 26, 2014. Zhivnevsky, a 25-year-old anti government protester, was killed by gunshot during clashes with Ukrainian police on January 22.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests - Body of martyr Mikhail Zhivnevsky paraded thr
Jan. 26, 2014. Although he was Belorussian, Zhivnevsky was a nationalized Ukrainian and was a member of a right wing nationalist movement that are causing much of the violence in Ukraine.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests - Body of martyr Mikhail Zhivnevsky paraded thr
Jan. 26, 2014. Emotional mourners view the body of Mikhail Zhivnevsky as it is paraded through Kiev's Independence Square after a memorial service. Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests - Body of martyr Mikhail Zhivnevsky paraded thr
Jan. 26, 2014. Right wing nationalists carry the body of Mikhail Zhivnevsky through central Kiev.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 27, 2014. Community spirit and a workman like attitude are integral to the momentum of Independence Square and it's resolve. Food, hot tea and a steady supply of firewood keep the arctic temperatures at bay.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Right Wing
Jan. 27, 2014. Claims have been made that right wing militants are hijacking the Ukrainian revolution. On Monday evening a group of recruits went through military tactical exercises in Independence square.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests: A view of Independence Square
Jan. 27, 2014. A view of Euro Maidan, Kiev's Independence Square at sunset.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 28, 2014. Protesters from Eastern Ukraine have been living in Independence Square for two months. Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests_Battle of Kruty Anniversary
Jan. 29, 2014. Led by Orthodox priests, a procession marches to the memorial of the battle of Ktury for an anniversary mass remembering 300 students sent to the town of Kruty on Jan. 29, 1918 to defend the city of Kiev against the advancing Bolshevik. About half of them lost their lives.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests_Battle of Kruty Anniversary
Jan. 29, 2014. Ukrainian women warm their hands on burning incense in freezing conditions at the memorial of the battle of Ktury for an anniversary mass remembering 300 students sent to the town of Kruty on Jan. 29, 1918 to defend the city of Kiev against the advancing Bolshevik.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 29, 2014. A group of "Mamas," Ukrainian women pleading with police not to attack protesters, stage their daily protest in "no man's land," between the police and the demonstrators' barricades.Ross McDonnell
Ukraine Protests
Jan. 28, 2014. A young protester tags his WWII-style helmet. Old Soviet military surplus has become popular among demonstrators in Kiev. Ross McDonnell

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