contact : justmiel@gmail.com
Justyna Mielnikiewicz, an award-winning Polish documentary photographer. She collaborates with leading international media outlets, including among others Newsweek, Le Monde, Stern, The New York Times, Washington Post, GEO France , National Geographic USA , and regularly with The Wall Street Journal. She is the recipient of numerous prestigious awards, such as World Press Photo, Aftermath Project Grant, Eugene Smith Memorial Fund (2016), Canon Female Photojournalist Prize, and the Caucasus Young Photographer Award (Magnum Foundation). In 2023, she won the Olivier Rebbot Award (Overseas Press Club of America) for the best international photo reportage published in any medium (for WSJ, from Ukraine).A major part of her work is devoted to personal, long-term projects, published in book form: Woman with a Monkey – Caucasus in Short Notes and Photographs (2014), Ukraine Runs Through It (2019, shortlisted for Paris Photo / Aperture Best Book Award) and GOGO Magazine (2022, art book on women in the USSR and post-Soviet countries)
Awards & Honors (selected)
2023 – Winner of Olivier Rebbot Award, Overseas Press Club of America (The War in Ukraine: Portraits of Resilience and Resistance), My short speech starts at 33rd min
2019 – Ukraine Runs Through It – finalist, among best 20 books at Paris Photo / Aperture Best Book Award
2015 – Woman with a Monkey – became a Book of the Year & Self-published Book of the Year, at Fotofestiwal Łódź
2011 – Winner at Caucasus Young Photographer Award (Magnum Foundation)
2009 – Winner at Canon Female Photojournalist Prize (Visa pour l’Image, Perpignan)
* earlier distinctions (Open Society Production Grant, Newsweek Polska competition , Polish Press Photo, among others).
She conducts photography workshops and specializes in documenting social and geopolitical transformations in Central Europe, the Caucasus, Ukraine and Russia in particular. Has experience in grant proposal writing , curating, organizing talks on various topics , was a judge in international photography competition and tutor for various institutions teaching photography.
Languages: Polish (native), English, Russian (advanced), Ukrainian (conversational, reading), Georgian (basic, reading, conversation ).
Education- Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland (1998), Master’s Degree – Cultural Studies (specialization: New Media & Cultural Management)
Master’s Thesis: Camille Paglia – Mona Lisa with a Mustache among Art Critics
Master’s Thesis: Camille Paglia – Mona Lisa with a Mustache among Art Critics
Exhibitions (selected)
2025
Belgrade Photo Month – Museum of Applied Arts (Afterimage, Polish Institute in Belgrade)
Galeria Rzeczna, Rybnik, Poland – solo exhibition (Ukraine)
Bukovina, Romania – IAM project on the Polish community
Tbilisi – Solidarity Talk and artist presentation (Polish Institute & Museum of Photography)
Galeria Rzeczna, Rybnik, Poland – solo exhibition (Ukraine)
Bukovina, Romania – IAM project on the Polish community
Tbilisi – Solidarity Talk and artist presentation (Polish Institute & Museum of Photography)
2024
Bucharest, Romania – IAM exhibition, project on the Polish community
2022
Paris City Hall Gates - Portraits of Resistance, Ukraine
Polish Institute in Paris – Portraits of Resistance, Ukraine
Tbilisi Photography Museum – Ukraine Runs Through It
PHOTO IS:RAEL, Tel Aviv – solo exhibition + workshops with Ukrainian refugee teenagers
PHOTO IS:RAEL, Tel Aviv – solo exhibition + workshops with Ukrainian refugee teenagers
Instytut Fotografii Fort, Warsaw , solo exhibition on Ukraine
2017–2019
Eyes on Main Street, Wilson Outdoor Photo Festival (USA) – Ukraine Project
Cortona on the Move (Italy) – The Meaning of Nation: Russia and Its Neighbors
Collective Book Publications (selected)
Relentless Courage: Ukraine and the World at War (Blue Star Press, USA, 2022)
Ukraine: A War Crime (FotoEvidence, USA, 2023)
We Had a Normal Life. Ukraine 2004–2024 (Hartmann Books, Germany, 2024)
Ukraine: A War Crime (FotoEvidence, USA, 2023)
We Had a Normal Life. Ukraine 2004–2024 (Hartmann Books, Germany, 2024)
This Day of Change, ( USA 2009) , 132 photographers from around the world visually documented January 20th, 2009, the day Barack Obama was inaugurated president