Train to the future

BY KRISTINA SERGEEVA

Norilsk is the northernmost city in the world with a population of over 150,000. An artificially created industrial city during Stalin's repressions, Norilsk is popular for its various mineral resources and large mining operations. Norilsk is associated with permafrost, lack of light, depressing landscapes and a grim history.

I went on a photographic expedition to Norilsk with the aim of reflecting the identity of contemporary Russia through the mythologization of ruinized spaces. Train to the future is a journey into a future that has already arrived.

I see Norilsk as a place where the sense of time has been lost. As in all of Russia, the war has suspended the present. I am trying to find a suitable metaphor for the new time, the thin line between past and future. Wandering around the city, I imagine myself as a discoverer of a new land that is no longer with me. During the creation of the project, I was inspired by the stories of eyewitnesses about the victims of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.

SHORT BIOGRAPHY

Kristina Sergeeva (1996) is a visual artist from St. Petersburg, Russia. She uses photography, book and print forms in her artistic practice. The field of study in Kristina's projects revolves around the exploration of themes of collective and individual memory and personal perception of the contemporary Russian context. In her work she focuses on reworking and making sense of history, searching for national identity through observation and exploration of the landscape of post-soviet space.

Website
https://kristina-sergeeva.ru

Instagram
https://www.instagram.com/_tinaserg/