Hauntingly Beautiful Infrared Photos of Life Arising Amongst the Rust of the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone

A post shared by Kolari Vision (@kolarivision) on Dec 28, 2017 at 7:06am PST

Photographer Vladimir Migutin traveled to the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone to photograph what remained after the catastrophic nuclear plant disaster of 1986. What Migutin found when he arrived, however, was not a barren wasteland, but an amazing example of the power of nature as it flourished through and around the rusted metal of human-made items. Migutin captured this incredible duality in hauntingly beautiful infrared photos.

This place IS the place for these contrasts. It’s pretty hard to describe the overall atmosphere I experienced during this trip. Despite the events of 1986, the ruins, and the rust, I didn’t have grim feelings while traveling there. On the contrary, it felt like I was in a “kind of” paradise on a different planet. Thirty years after the fallout, while men still stay away, the forests, the animals, the plants, everything is thriving, revived by nature.