Train to the Future

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 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.