War Notes: Abridged

New York: Fugitive Materials, 2022. Saddle-stapled in photographic wraps. [37] pp. 5 1/2 x 8 1/2 in.

The abridged version of Pulitzer Prize-nominated photojournalist Cheney Orr’s portraits and interviews taken during his time in Ukraine in the Spring of 2022, and co-created with Ukrainian citizens during wartime - 17 of the 53 diptychs.

War Notes is a project of memories in the making, chronicling the photographer’s encounters over six weeks traveling through Lviv, Odesa, Kyiv, and east to Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv, collecting a total of 53 portraits and interviews. Per participant, a single Fuji FP-100c polaroid was made. Orr then asked each participant to write their memories and emotions on a separate unexposed blank polaroid and conducted an in-depth interview. The polaroid portraits and written stories were collected in a single photo album that the artist carried with him as he traveled the country.

War Notes breaks from the constraints of contemporary photojournalism, urgent deadlines, and the sensationalism often seen in war images. Instead, it focuses on the individuals, raw with recent experiences, as co-creators - offering them time and an opportunity to express themselves.

This project was a rare chance for the publisher and photographer, two brothers, to collaborate. Released in October 2022 in an edition of 50.

20% of proceeds from War Notes: Abridged will be donated to 24.02 Fund, supporting Ukrainian journalists in the line of duty.