Khrystyna Korol has spent years documenting Ukrainian theatre through photography — more than 180 productions and counting. Now she's turning that practice into a question of its own: why do we talk so little about the people who photograph theatre, and the history they're quietly preserving?
Khrystyna Korol is a theatre scholar and theatre photographer based in Lviv. She researches theatre photography as a way of documenting contemporary theatre and preserving its history, working with Ukrainian theatres, festivals and independent art projects to photograph performances, rehearsals, labs and performances of all kinds. Over recent years she has documented more than 180 theatre events. Alongside this, she works in theatre criticism, writing articles and producing video reviews of productions; her work has appeared in the professional publications Proscaenium, Ukrainian Theatre and Theatrarium. She is currently studying on the master's program "Performing Arts. Theatre Studies" at Ivan Franko National University of Lviv.
Her engagement with theatre photography began in her second year of study, when the Maya Harbuzyuk Foundation supported her first theatre-photography exhibition, Dynamics of the Moment. By then she was already photographing productions in most of Lviv's theatres, working with the Vasyl Vasylko Odesa Academic Ukrainian Music and Drama Theatre, and serving as photographer for the "Golden Lion" International Theatre Festival. In 2025, her work was also shown in the exhibition project "Theatre Costume on Stage, Backstage and Through the Lens," part of the Lviv International Scenography Quadrennial.
Her practical work as a photographer gradually grew into a research interest. While still studying, she devoted her coursework to theatre photography: first with "Photography as a Way of Documenting a Performance (Based on the Work of Contemporary Lviv Photographers)," then with "Contemporary Ukrainian Theatre Photography: Communicative Potential" — and she is now working on a master's thesis, "The Transformation of Theatre Photography in the Context of Socio-Cultural Conditions in 21st-Century Ukraine." It was this combination of practical experience and theatre studies research that let her see how theatre photography in Ukraine remains almost invisible as a distinct genre of photography, despite being an inseparable part of the theatrical process and one of the sources for documenting theatre history.
"Why do we talk so little about theatre photographers? Why is there almost no public space where they can talk about their experience, their challenges, their principles of work, or their own view of the profession?"
On her blog, Theater Hunter, she regularly attends theatre festivals across Ukraine, records video reviews of programs and productions, and analyzes artistic choices, directing approaches and the social themes a given production raises. What matters to her isn't just recommending shows, but asking questions, offering different ways of reading a stage work, and inviting audiences to think. She deliberately chose video as her format, convinced it's far more accessible to a broad audience than academic articles or specialist theatre publications — articles remain an important part of her work, but video lets her draw in people who might never open a professional theatre journal, yet are willing to watch, listen, ask questions and think together.
In 2025, after she wrote on her blog about her master's research into theatre photography, she was invited to speak in the public conversation series "Dialogues on the Sofa," part of the "Golden Applause of Bukovyna" theatre festival, on the topic "Theatre Photography as a Tool for Preserving History: On My Own Experience in Photography and Research." That conversation, she says, confirmed that interest in the subject extended beyond photographers themselves and into the theatre community — and convinced her further that Ukraine lacks a regular public space where theatre photography can be discussed systematically, openly, and from different perspectives.
The idea for a podcast grew directly out of a public discussion she organized in 2026 as part of the Scenography Quadrennial festival, titled "Theatre Photography: Art or Reportage?" Theatre photographers Artur Buzenko, Anastasiia Khlibnyk and Daria Bedernichek took part, alongside PR specialist Vira Polianska and Korol herself as both theatre photographer and event organizer; theatre scholar Oleksandra Shutova moderated. The conversation ranged over how photographers enter the profession, where the line between art and reportage falls, how collaboration between theatre and photographer takes shape, and photography's role in how theatres communicate. Some questions drew such different positions that the discussion continued well after the event officially ended — which is when she realized one conversation wasn't enough. That discussion became the starting point for Theater Hunter Talks.
Theater Hunter Talks is the first Ukrainian podcast about theatre photography, aiming to make visible the people who preserve theatre's history. Korol wants it to feel less like an educational course or lecture series and more like a live, informal conversation with people who work in and around theatre — personal stories, different approaches to the work, creative searching, professional doubt, and the real challenges her guests face. Its guests will include theatre photographers, theatre scholars, art historians, theatre representatives, and specialists in archiving, copyright, communications and theatre media, with conversations covering not just photography as artistic practice but the whole set of questions around it: documenting contemporary theatre, preserving theatre archives, the role of photography in researching theatre history, communication between theatres and photographers, and the particularities of working in a theatre environment.
The project is realized with support from the Per Forma grant program by Kyiv Contemporary Music Days, in partnership with the Performing Arts Fund NL, and with support from the Netherlands' Ministry of Education, Culture and Science. The podcast is set to launch in the second half of August 2026.
More from Khrystyna Korol and Theater Hunter can be found on Instagram @theatre.hunter.