SERGEI ILNITSKY photography

That was and unfortunately is the civil war trivial by the facts but with terrible consequences for the civilians. That was a strange war. It became clear in the early hours of my arrival in Donetsk, which was besieged by the militaries. The city with modern infrastructure, factories, mines, universities, airport with a population of over one million of inhabitants was deserted and quiet. It was a creepy and frightening sight - empty streets, no cars, no people. And the reason for this emptiness was obvious - several times a day the city and its outskirts were under rocket attack and mortar fire. Those are not precision-guided munition, as you know. So the area residents, who had not left the city, were hiding in their cellars and bomb shelters. They lived there without light and with little food and water for weeks. The militaries fired without system just randomly on the residential areas, infrastructure, schools and kindergartens. There were hundreds of civilians killed on the streets, in their apartments and houses, in the stores and markets, in the public transport. There were weeks when civilians were killed more than militaries. I was horrified by the senselessness and brutality of this war. If I had not seen this I would not have believed that such is possible in a civilized world in Europe in the 21st century.

Russia has 62 colonies for the underage prisoners where keep 15 thousand children. "... Every morning waking up in a smelly barrack, hearing the noise of the crowd around me & cries of oders, I want to believe that it is not real, but a dream. And in fact, I'm at home in my own bed, my mom making breakfast, I wake up, I take a warm shower, and then I go to school. A minute passes, and I realize that this is just a dream, but the reality is ... I'm in colony and start another day in my struggle for survival - 455 Day "- from a letter of 16 year-old Pavel Gusev sentenced to 2 years for theft. The childhood for the boys of their age ended too early by the will of fate and chance. Behind all the boys had a very bitter experience that locked them behind huge fences topped with barbed wire and watchtowers with armed guards around the barracks, in a place with hard security and rules of life, unchildish tie with people around them, with the physicals and psychological limitations - to the colony for young prisoners. The system of relations based on humiliation and submission, power, and authority, norms and principles of the criminal world, which have emerged in the Russian colony for juvenile people, not relearning young prisoners, but, on the contrary, are the first stage in a large criminal world. More than 50 percent of boys have passed through the colony within a year after the release back to the colony for adults and about 20 percent of them become professional criminals. Life in colony has a strict regime. The prisoners wake up at 6:30 am, wash, smoke and march on the rank with song for their morning roll-call. After boys have their breakfast and time for cleaning their living room. At 8 am part of prisoners goes to the school, other go to the factory which manufacture of the working clothes and the different military uniform. After dinner this group changes. Every 30 minutes all who want smoke may go with the rank to a special place for smoking and during 15 minutes enjoy standing outdoors. All prisoners have no case go out from their living building free only with the security officers or the reformer.

Sochi. The Extreme Park. Winter Olympic Games 2014. Ski acrobatics. The complexity and beauty of this real Winter Olympic sport is amazing and mesmerizing. Snow, slope, light, a second acceleration ski jumping board, jump, complex acrobatic elements in flight and verified before millimeters landing. For spectators it all merges into a single fleeting moment not without elements of the show - someone fell, and someone has complied with all the elements perfectly - there are winners and losers, light and music. But the ability of photography to capture a moment allows us to feel the unreality, slowed beauty of flight and a certain other-worldliness of this sport.

Ski jumping is a sport of the courageous and strong athletes, who were able to overcome fear and uncertainty to challenge not peculiar to human nature element - flight. Years of training helped them understand and feel the wind streams and subdue to yourself speed unrealistic for a human, forcing them to work together for the goal - to jump stronger, fly fast and land on all. And cherished line which applies ski is not the end of the flight, but the beginning of the next, which must be stronger, faster and farther.

Winter Olympic Game in Sochi. Extreme Park -place where were concentrated sports for the most daring, decisive, headless virtuoso, able to make snow, speed, slope and own body to work on the creation of incredible beauty and complexity of pirouettes, defeating forever prevails over man the force of gravity and delighting audiences the possibility of the impossible. But man is not a machine, which are not peculiar errors. Therefore, the way to the flight, to perfection and to not possible often passes through the errors, falls and injuries. And the power of a true athlete, winner, to rise after the fall, to clench his teeth, to fight the pain and fear, and again to go to the mountain that would make another attempt with faith in victory and this time to Win! And this is the essence of not only sports, but also our human life.

Years of training, thousands of battles, and hundreds of victories prepared fencing competitors for the opportunity to stand on the piste at the 2012 London Olympic Games to fight for gold.

The number of servicemen in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation is 1,000,000 people, including 13,706 service-women. Male Russian citizens aged from 18 till 27-years-old are still eligible for conscription. National Service campaigns are carried out twice a year: in Spring and in Autumn, on the basis of Russian Presidential decrees. The 2012 Spring draft calls for 155,000 young men to be called-up to complete their military service duties. The Russian constitution (Article 59) establishes that: Defense of the Fatherland is a duty and obligation of a citizen of the Russian Federation (RF); In case military service contradicts beliefs or religion of RF citizen, and also in other cases established by the federal law, RF citizen has the right to replace military service with an alternative civil service. According to Russian public opinion poll, about 42 per cent of respondents condemn those who evade military service, while 39 per cent, on the contrary, understand and sympathize with them.

This story tells about people who have been living in Russian part of Gorny Altai for hundred years. They bred the deer and cut their antlers for produce a very important pharmacy’s substance - pantokrein. They have been doing it for hundreds of years. Deer with big horns is a symbol and holy animal of Republic of Gorny Altai. The inhabitants of Altai revere and respect this animal for its strength, nobility and beauty. But every year in June they cut off the deer' horns at the special farms. On the early spring the deer's horn called – PANT is a fresh and their bone sponge is pervaded with blood. When the horns become bloodshot workers drive the deer to the special bench and by means of a hacksaw cut of the horns. Then the PANTS have been boiling, drying and frying for several months and only in the late of the fall they sell all horns to the China, Japan and Korea where produce a valuable substance - pantekrein which is used in medicine. This is a very expensive substance - one kilogram of the horn costs 400 - 600 US dollars. Canned pants are used in traditional medicine in the Southeast Asia for more than 2 000 years.

This is story about folks that remain single at elderly age for different reasons. Many of them were imprisoned the half life and more. When comes their term of leave the prison cell they have nothing - no relatives, no children, no home. The Russian State move this sort of people to the farthest settlement where they live as in the prison in common barracks for 20 people, with bathroom on 90 old people many of them can't up from their bed without help. In this place nobody have the friends and the more powerful inmates disgrace the weeks. They didn't have any housing in possession or children and beloved by side. Many of them have the mental or the physical illnesses. But there were other time, another life with children and dear people, deeds and fulfillment, a life merry and light one. That life is spoken of by only medals of military years, photographs of children on the wall and probably the years - wise heavy glances, sometime flashed by the light of remembrance. The life which these people lead now is just waiting for death with memory being a sole engine. People are always born in joy, live through light and black periods, and die in solitude. A hostel dormitory where these people live their last days are situated in hard to access Siberian corner, in the taiga site of Kemerovo area in village of Blagoveshenka.