Boryana Katsarova's extraordinary Freezing series of portraits on show in Leeds

There’s a hackneyed set of cliches surrounding England’s north-south divide – southerners are metrosexual softies, northerners are unrefined gravy-scoffers etc etc. A lazier journalist than I might suggest that Bulgarian photographer Boryana Katsarova’s brilliant Freezing series of weather-beaten commuters is a perfect fit for The Gallery at Flannels in Leeds. But I’m not going there. I’m better than that.

Anyway back to Boryana, because this is a stunning series of portraits taken in a bitter cold-snap that caused no shortage of problems in her native Sofia. There’s a painterly quality to them and a quiet sense of trudging on in the face of nature’s sometime spite.

They are on display as part of the Other Worlds show opening this week which features 12 Soviet photographers with diverse takes on a region we still struggle to comprehend.

Other Worlds runs from May 17 to July 15.