© Rafal Milach ; Sasha and Nastya, Novosibirs from the „7 rooms” series, 2004-2010
Zacheta National Gallery of Art pl. Malachowskiego 3 00-916 Warszawa Pologne
Rafał Milach presents the stories of Russians who were born in the USSR, but whose adult lives run their course in the Russia of Vladimir Putin. This is a tale of ordinary people, of their friends and family, and of the world in which they live. In Milach’s photographs are to be found neither extremism nor sensationalism. We observe the everyday life of representatives of the generation of thirty-somethings that the photographer has been a witness to over the course of the last six years. “I have been through three phases in my relationships with my heroes. First, they were my guides through their cities, then they became the heroes of my photos, and then finally they became friends with whom I talk more than I photograph”,’ the artist explains.
The series 7 Rooms is composed of six stories whose heroes come from various parts of the former Soviet Union. Gala lived in Yekaterinburg, but then emigrated with her family to France. Mira’s roots are in Khakassia, she was born in Moscow and spent most of her life in Krasnoyarsk. Sasha and Nastya from Yekaterinburg live in their own world, not making any concessions to the world around them. Lena is a Kazakh with Russian roots, who lives in Moscow and is an immunologist. Stas, a journalist, is a ‘real Siberian bear’ who lives in Krasnoyarsk with his family, but travels a great deal, writing texts for election campaigns. Vasya is from a village near to Yekaterinburg. During the day he looks after his young daughter, while by night, under the pseudonym of Panikhida, he is a star of the local drag queen scene.
The seventh room of the title is above all dedicated to the reports of Svetlana Alexievitch, in other words to the metaphorical baggage of the generation born in the USSR. No matter whether this is the space of the double life of Vasya or the room of Sasha and Nastya, it nonetheless constitutes a single narrative. A separate space at the exhibition is dedicated to each story, within which photographs are accompanied by the heroes’ stories. The entrance to the exhibition is a multimedia installation showing each of the characters in their surroundings: at home, at work, on their housing estate or in the city.
An important supplement to the stories presented by Milach are fragments from Alexievitch’s book Enchanted with Death (published in the folder accompanying the exhibition). The author tells the private stories of people whose lives have unfolded together with the end of the Soviet Union. The broadening of 7 Rooms to include the question of memory and the contrasting of contemporary history with a history that is still very recent opens the possibility of a better understanding of Russians. On completing the project, Rafał Milach said: ‘In Russia, there are a huge number of paradoxes. Sometimes it seemed to me that I understood some of them, only to find that my next trip proved that I was mistaken’.
Image : © Rafal Milach