BEHIND THE LENS: Virus, vaccine, and some arresting images

DATE: April-October 2021

PLACE: Tandil, Argentina; New Delhi, India; Quezon City, Philippines; Havana, Cuba; Rivne, Ukraine.

PHOTOGRAPHERS: Natacha Pisarenko; Amit Sharma; Aaron Favila; Ramon Espinosa; Evgeniy Maloletka.

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How does the eye even begin to process this image? A man running through funeral pyres of COVID-19 victims at a crematorium in India, as if fleeing death itself, captured by Amit Sharma.

Chronicling the coronavirus and the disease it causes for a second straight year, and this year's vaccine saga, AP photographers found new ways of telling the story.

Natacha Pisarenko in Argentina found her muse in a piece of clear plastic, the sort-of, kind-of touchpoint that separated an 86-year-old man and his daughter-in-law who came together under COVID protocols. Ramon Espinosa found it by combining two notions in Cuba -- nuns being vaccinated and a framed image of Che Guevara.

Aaron Favila in the Philippines found it in little Kian Navales, sitting in a chair holding a pillow that bears the image of his late father, Arthur, who died of COVID. The boy misses going out for noodles with his dad.

And in a photo that’s hard to look away from, Evgeniy Maloletka photographed a coffin containing the body of a man who died of COVID in Rivne, Ukraine. The man is wearing a shirt and blazer. Only his mouth is visible. His arms are crossed, and in his right hand he is carrying a cross.

Lonely, just like COVID itself.

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QUOTED

Amit Sharma, Associated Press photographer:

“On that bleak April afternoon at Ghazipur crematorium in New Delhi, India, there were burning bodies as far as the eye could see. I had just reached the grounds, my profession weighing heavy on my mind. I was anxious about capturing the frightening...