MOTHERLAND (2018-ONGOING)

My mother was born on the edge of a forest in Belarus. She lost her baby, my sibling, because of the Chernobyl disaster. She struggled as a single mother and she sacrificed everything for me. My mother had 19 golden fillings for 20 years — she used them to buy my first camera. She lives in a small village in the East of Belarus. Almost nobody knows where Belarus is. A lot of people in Europe think that it’s located somewhere in Siberia.

For a few years, I obsessively took portraits of her and the universe she created in her parents’ house. It was the universe of my mother — my Motherland. In March 2021, I had to leave Belarus. Since then, I haven’t seen my mother, but we continue to speak by phone. I began to make screenshots as we spoke and as she showed me her everyday life. My morning begins with audio messages that my mother sends me every day. These images and connections became my unexpected link to the home I think I have lost forever. This is my ode to my Motherland that I will never lose.