Caring for our past

The text ‘Caring for our past’ tells the story of the Ukrainian caregivers community in Italy and what it means to care for a stranger while the people you love the most are living through a war. However, this project also involves the story of my family and begins within the walls of my own home, before Russia invaded Ukraine. In 2020, my grandmother fell ill with Covid-19 and was forced to spend three months in the hospital, which debilitated her to the point that she needed assistance once she returned home. This is how my life intersects with that of Lyubov, the Ukrainian caregiver hired by my family to look after my grandmother. Interested in her life choices as a migrant mother, and in her new role in my family, I began spending time with her and documenting her daily life. This experience involved me so much that I decided to include the Ukrainian community, which Lyubov introduced me to, in my photographs. The outbreak of the conflict also somehow affected my family, as Lyubov's daughter and granddaughter were hosted at my grandmother's home after fleeing Ukraine: the girls and children were the only ones allowed to escape the war. Thus, for several months, four generations of women from two different nationalities lived together in a 50-square-meter apartment, with the trauma of their war experiences, the anxieties of an ongoing conflict, and the different needs of children and the elderly. This cohabitation was a mix of moments of great joy and significant tensions. After a short break from this intense period, supported by the Alex Hillman Foundation Fellowship, I’m resuming my documentation of the lives of several women from the Ukrainian community between Rovigo, Bologna, and Milan, telling the story—over more than a year—of the challenges of living through a distant conflict. Before the Russian invasion, Italy hosted one of the largest communities of people of Ukrainian origin among European Union member states, largely composed of women working in elderly care services. The caregiver profession is one of the lowest in the job market, although most of them have a good level of education, and many were qualified workers before emigrating. Their work experience is characterized by isolation, subordination, and emotional stress. Many home caregivers are in constant close contact with the person they care for, 24 hours a day. They are present during the most vulnerable moments of the elderly: changing them, washing them, feeding them. They live in their employers' homes as if they had always been part of them, sleeping in the old rooms of the children and moving from one home to another while the old family photos hanging on the walls watch their movements. They find themselves adapting their personal space to the one offered by the house that hosts them, living in an environment they call "home," though it is not really home. The bedrooms become their refuges, and their days are marked by the ringing of the phone and the latest updates on the areas under attack, always anxious for the fear that their family members and friends might be harmed. When we talk about war or conflict, words like invasion, border, loss, compromise, withdrawal, and raid are used. In their own way, caregivers also experience these terms in their daily lives: the invasion of their personal physical and emotional space, the negotiation between the two parties, the loss of intimacy, and the withdrawal from their homeland and family. They live a war from afar and face an internal conflict. A silent change imposed itself on my life and my family's. An outsider, initially a stranger, began to invade our space, disrupting our daily balance. Managing the household became a constant process of adaptation, especially when a new family unit entered the picture. It was a journey of redefinition, even of the most intimate boundaries. And, as if closing a cycle, the loss of my grandmother in the midst of the project marked a turning point in our grieving process.  

Chiara Negrello