Nostalgia by Pavel Romaniko

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The work represented in this portfolio is an ongoing body of work that I began in 2008. The pieces are miniature sets constructed out of paper and then photographed. The project is a reflection on the topic of exile, home, and developing a relationship with one’s past and belonging. It is a very personal project to me. Yet I also find myself contemplating a number of metaphorical connections to current events in my homeland of Russia and the country’s uneasy relationship with its own past.

I regard nostalgia as palpable and real and believe it has great impact on constructs of cultural memories. Creating these images I reflect on the fact that photographs produced by a culture and then continuously circulated in history textbooks and catalogs need to be carefully examined. Thus I imply that perhaps, because remnants of history are scattered all over with no sign of provenance, they have no ability to tell a story of their own but can only remain as a form of melancholic nostalgia.

- Pavel Romaniko

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