The Frontline Club, Supporting Freelance Journalism For Almost 20 Years

During the turmoil of the 1989 Romanian revolution, a group of freelance cameramen specialising in frontline war reporting banded together to form Frontline News TV. By 2003, although most of the team had tragically been killed, the spirit of cooperation endured. One of the two surviving members, Vaughan Smith, stirred to give the operation physical form, founded the Frontline Club: a gathering place to honour fallen colleagues, promote free speech activism and provide an effective platform from which to support independent journalism, diversity, professionalism and safe practice in the media. Through its own charitable initiatives, the Club champions freelance journalism, lobbies for better support for the freelance journalistic community, and is recognised as having changed the face of war reporting. 

The Frontline Club has occupied an old tool factory in Paddington for almost 20 years. The décor is a celebration of the Club’s mission and history. The walls are adorned with an exposition of war photography current and iconic, and the members’ clubroom doubles as a living museum, displaying a quirky collection of artefacts. The Club also includes a restaurant open to the general public and a discussion forum. The events programme has long drawn-in a diverse group of the world’s best journalists, photographers, filmmakers and thinkers: John Simpson, Christina Lamb, Jeremy Paxman, Peter Jukes, Louis Theroux, Gillian Tett, as well as Julian Assange and the late Alexander Litvinenko. The Club also hosts film screenings and workshops in skills such as camera work and hostile environment training.

At the outset of the Ukraine war, the Club sprang into action. On the night of March 20th, a movement spearheaded by Frontline projected the Ukrainian flag onto the Russian embassy. Freelance journalists Oleksandra Kuvshynova, Brent Renaud, Pierre Zakrzewski, Yevhenii Sakun and Viktor Dudar were killed reporting near Kyiv that very week. The protest brought awareness to their sacrifice, and marked the launch of the new #StraightFromTheFrontline campaign in spectacular fashion. This vital new initiative seeks to provide urgent support to freelance journalists risking their lives in Ukraine, and to ensure their work gets out and truth triumphs in the parallel information war.

#StraightFromTheFrontline hopes to raise £100,000 through GoFundMe. These funds will help establish a 24/7 home base for all freelancers in or going to Ukraine, delivering all the support functions that a staff journalist would normally get from their employer: checking-in daily from the field, alerting others if they go missing, aiding field collaboration, holding next-of-kin details, sourcing equipment, warding direct financial grants to underpin safe practice, assisting in the distribution of their content to allow them to focus on fieldwork, providing press cards and first aid equipment, as well as continuing to be a collective voice to represent their interests and raise their profiles. Frontline Club founder Vaughan Smith made his way to Lviv to set up this outpost himself.

Donations to the #StraightFromTheFrontline charity can be made here.