Photographer Vera Elyjiw Sytch documents her travels (10/23/05)

Photographer Vera Elyjiw Sytch documents her travels

ROCHESTER, N.Y. - An exhibition of photographs by Vera Elyjiw Sytch, titled "Scenes of Village Life in Ukraine," was on view from July 12 through August 31 in Rochester's Kodak Park. The exhibit documented one of the five trips to Ukraine that the photographer had undertaken with her husband and three young children since 1999.

Ms. Sytch, who works as a marketing communications writer for Eastman Kodak Co., noted in the introduction to her exhibit: "Ukraine, the second largest country in Europe following Russia, is located at the crossroads between Europe and Asia. This is the country that my parents left during the turmoil of World War II. I heard too much about this land as I grew up. Eventually, after glasnost, my husband-to-be came to America. After our marriage, my tie to the old motherland was strengthened: my husband came from the same small town [Kopychyntsi, Ternopil region] as my father."

She continues: "As our children began to grow up, it became increasingly important for them to know their family's heritage and their grandparents, aunt, uncles and cousins in Ukraine. So in 1999, when the children were just 3, 5 and 7 years old, we took the first of five trips to Ukraine."

She writes that in the village they saw a lifestyle that touched them deeply: "I felt I'd stepped back in time to when life was simpler, but daily chores much harder to perform. ... Yet the people are cheerful and very hospitable, always ready to chat over a cup of tea or serve you a meal whether you're hungry or not."

Ms. Sytch then invited guests at her exhibit to "step back in time with me."

* * *

In college, Ms. Sytch had majored in biology. After getting her bachelor's degree, she had a change of heart and earned a second bachelor's in professional photography from the Rochester Institute of Technology.

After brief stints working in a portrait studio, then in a professional studio, her photography degree got her a job in Japan for the Minolta Camera Co. as a technical writer. During her two years in Japan Ms. Sytch spent her free time traveling through the country and photographing the Japanese people and scenery.

When she left Japan, Ms. Sytch photographed while traveling through Burma; trekking near the Golden Triangle in Thailand and in the Himalayas of Nepal and India; whitewater rafting in Nepal; and hiking coast to coast across England.

The photographs she took during these travels were published in the "Sacred Spaces" series of calendars and note cards, and in Minolta Mirror, which bills itself as "an international magazine of photography."

Back in the United States, Ms. Sytch worked as both a photographer and freelance writer. In 2001 she took a job at Eastman Kodak Co. in marketing communications, a position in which she writes and occasionally supplies photographs of her children and travels for Kodak webpages and printed communications. Her photos can be found in the Kodak Image Library.

In 2003 Ms. Sytch traveled as a photo journalist on a medical mission into the West African bush of Senegal, where she documented the work of the doctors and nurses on the mission. Her photos of Senegal won first and second place in Kodak's International Salon photo contest and are widely used by mission organizations across the United States.

Three of Ms. Sytch's photos from Ukraine are published in the book "The Joy of Digital Photography Printing."

Most recently, Ms. Sytch returned from yet another trip to Ukraine during which she continued her series of photographs of village life in Ukraine.

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