Messengers and Promises
by Lesha Pavlov
portfolio winners call 'Urbanautica Institute Awards 2023', 2023
Category: Nature, Environment and Perspectives
In Norilsk there are many pipes, strange stones underfoot and dove-colored clouds. People are digging up valuable resources from nearby mountains. For centuries, shamans climbed there to recharge with the energy of the Sun, which almost never sets in the short northern summer.
About ten years ago, pigeons were noticed here, inhabiting a territory previously inaccessible to them due to the harsh climate. In local beliefs, the most important place is occupied by winged demiurges. At the same time, images of synanthropic species, including pigeons, are not found for obvious reasons. John Berger wrote that animals are able to surprise us with secrets addressed specifically to humans. What if the moment has come when we should try to decipher this messages?
In the process of reflection, I direct my gaze to the environment. And send my thoughts to the future. The camera in my hands tangles everything. The resulting photographs depict a world that exists everywhere and nowhere, today and tomorrow. A harmless bird captured in this way frightens me.
Pigeon doesn’t care. It lives where it lives.
also from Urbanautica Institute Awards 2023