Photographer of the Week: Sergey Ponomorev

Sergey Ponomorev's photograph was selected to win The Breaking News Pulitzer Award in 2016, among contributing photographers for The New York Times who covered the refugee crisis in Libya during 2015.

It is difficult to prescribe Sergey Ponomarev's notoriety with a single photograph. However, the photograph above has distinguished Sergey Ponomarev's career by internationally linking his content to a wider audience.

The photograph was part of a series taken on an assignment following the European migration crisis in 2015. Captions from Sergey Ponomarev's website explains the photograph's context, "Migrants arrive by a Turkish boat near the village of Skala on the Greek island of Lesbos. The Turkish boat owner delivered some 150 people to the Greek coast and tried to escape back to Turkey; he was arrested in Turkish waters."
 
The image is euphoric and also tragic, aligned with Sergey Ponomarev's motivation for documenting the lives of people who span beyond the conflict that surrounds them.
 
This photograph was initially my favorite. It demonstrates that one man with little power can still save 150 individuals with his actions. I was immediately drawn to the photograph with the liquid environment, foggy horizon and commotion that leans the boat. The only aspect that changes my initial favoritism, is that Sergey Ponomarev is good at his job, so the more I see, the harder it is to choose.

Sergey Ponomarev began working for The Associated Press in 2003 from his home country, Russia. According to an interview conducted by Daria Litvinova of The Moscow Times in 2016, when Sergey Ponomarev expressed his sentiments on moving away from The Associated Press in Russia, toward The New York Times he states, "The vast majority have lost their independence and are now on one or the other side of the fence. I prefer to work for outlets that are more independent." Sergey Ponomarev has contributed numerous works over the years as a freelance photographer without allowing himself to remain confined to the borders of countries in order to procure images and "stories that disturb the world".

Sergey Ponomarev often captures moments of conflict or desperation, however, that is not always his focus. He also captures what is in between the crux of cause and effect.

For instance, in 2013, Sergey Ponomarev worked on the photographic series, "Assad's Syria". His narrative details citizens as they move and survive through the motions of life, adapting to the violence that encompasses their environment. As opposed to telling the story of Syria through the brunt of conflict, he remained vigilant to speak on behalf of individuals and families that did not actively function as members within the conflict. Part of this was due to adaptation. Since he is from Russia he was only able to arrive in Syria through the side of the Syrian government. Despite his parameters, his approach was distinct and vital to the quality of images he produced.

His flexibility can be seen in the aesthetic of his photographs as well as the content. On April 8, 2017 Sergey Ponomarev photographs for "Will London Fall?", were published by The New York Times. Sergey takes a more experimental approach to photographing London after the demise of Brexit. He utilizes a slow-mo video technique, in which the scene of the photograph is stretched out over several frames, in order to synthesize a single moment. He explains his logic in an interview with The New York Times, "It's like a photograph but an extended moment before and seconds after the click. You can understand what a photographer sees and what he thinks when he takes a photograph."