Ximena Borrazás is a Uruguayan photographer and documentary filmmaker born in Montevideo in 1992. She focuses on armed conflicts, migration, and humanitarian crises. Her work combines visual sensitivity with a strong commitment to social justice, often addressing the experiences of women and displaced populations.

She has published with major international outlets, including National Geographic, The Guardian, BBC, CNN, DW, France 24, Al Jazeera, and the Associated Press, and has worked with institutions such as UNHCR, UNESCO, and IOM.

Ximena’s project in northern Ethiopia documents the devastating aftermath of the Tigray conflict, one of the deadliest wars of the 21st century. Her images portray survivors of sexual violence, displaced families, and the enduring effects of famine and trauma. This work earned her the 2024 Tom Stoddart Award for Excellence, the Gentex Corp Personal Safety Award from the Ian Parry Photojournalism Grant, and the Africa Mundi Award for best photographic publication in Planeta Futuro of El País.

Her long-term documentary project The Scars of War, which began in Tigray, combines photography, testimony, and documentation to investigate conflict-related sexual violence through a forensic lens. Rather than treating sexual violence as an isolated act, the project traces it as a weapon of war, examining physical, psychological, and social evidence left behind, and the systems, or lack thereof, that respond to it.

Ximena is currently based in Ukraine where, aside from continuing to photograph, she has a full-time job as a Liaison and Communications Officer with the United Nations.

On episode 286, Ximena discusses, among other things:

• Working for the UN in Ukraine
• Her first experience of visiting the Polish border
• The nature of working amidst drone warfare
• Challenges of being a freelancer in a conflict zone
• Why she doesn’t really want to be a photographer
• The experience of being in Kyiv on a daily basis
• Her life before photography
• Early forays into documentary work
• Her project in Tigray, Ethiopia and the context of the conflict there
• How she began The Scars of War, her work on conflict related sexual violence
• How serendipity on a HEFAT course led to publication in The Guardian
• How some X-rays changed everything and why they were so powerful
• How she has extended her project to other areas, and focussed on male victims
• How her job at the UN combines with her advocacy work

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