Kyiv holds farewell for 28-year-old Ukrainian photographer, soldier Huzenko

A farewell ceremony was held in Kyiv on Nov. 7 for Kostiantyn Huzenko, a photographer-turned-soldier, killed in a Russian strike on Dnipropetrovsk Oblast on Nov. 1.

Huzenko, 28, was a Kyiv photographer who documented the struggle and served within the thirty fifth Marine Brigade. He joined the military as a photographer and press officer in April 2024, simply over two years after the full-scale invasion started.

Before becoming a member of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Huzenko additionally labored as a media producer and podcaster. As a part of the Ukrainer staff, which he joined as a volunteer in 2020, he helped doc tales from territories liberated from Russian occupation after the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion.

“In every dangerous corner of our motherland, Kostia was never afraid to go anywhere,” Bogdan Logvynenko, a soldier and a founding father of Ukrainer, wrote on Facebook.

A procession moved from St. Michael’s Cathedral by way of the guts of Ukraine’s capital to Independence Square, which was gray and chilly, but crammed with individuals. Among the group stood many younger individuals holding flowers. Later, these flowers would cowl Huzenko’s coffin.

“Kostia wished everyone to come in vyshyvankas (embroidered shirts) and bring only real flowers,” Ukrainer wrote earlier than the funeral.

His mates gave farewell speeches, remembering him as a shiny, type, gifted, and mild individual, “someone you could talk to about anything.”

The ceremony was accompanied by music from Huzenko’s playlist, which he had created in case of his loss of life. Among those that got here to say goodbye was Marian Pyrih, a musician and soldier from Huzenko’s favourite band “Pyrih i Batih,” who carried out a number of songs.

“He did not see the world as black and white — he saw all its colors, all the interesting things it held,” Larisa Kalik, a photographer and pal of Huzenko, instructed the Kyiv Independent.

Two days after Huzenko’s loss of life, the thirtieth Marine Corps, which incorporates the thirty fifth Marine Brigade, confirmed that its service members had been focused within the Russian assault in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast. The corps didn’t specify which brigade was affected.

Friends and colleagues of Huzenko, talking with the Kyiv Independent, advised that the photographer had been killed on this assault, which reportedly struck an award ceremony the place troops had gathered.

The State Bureau of Investigation launched on Nov. 3 an inquiry into attainable negligence in navy service throughout martial legislation, which can have led to the deaths of Ukrainian service members in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast.

At the service, his mates centered on the humanity in his work.

“Even though he had recently been at the front, all these military photos showed so much humanity and warmth — such care for others, for loved ones,” Kalik stated. “We have lost an extraordinary person. He left us too soon.”