Hope St

Having moved to the USA in 2022, I was lucky to find myself in the community of Russian-speaking emigrants of the so-called Fourth Wave. The fourth wave of emigration from the USSR and post-Soviet states during the 1980s and 1990s was driven by political liberalization, ethnic tensions, and economic collapse. Leaving the USSR required navigating complex bureaucracy, including exit visas and invitation letters from abroad, often via Vienna and Rome under the supervision of international agencies. Many faced long waiting periods in transit countries almost without sustenance and the emotional strain of abandoning everything familiar.
The project’s title comes from the cover of a 1990 magazine article about the family of one of the participants, who in fact moved from Russia to Hope Street in Massachusetts. This project feels actual now as there are so many refugees fleeing from Russia and Ukraine across oceans all over the globe today.

Installation views

Wedeman Gallery in Newton, MA, USA in November 2025

The series narrates the stories of emigration through the things that were in my participants’ suitcases when they left homeland. At that time, it was a one-way journey. Like astronauts landing on a foreign planet, they knew nothing about the new world where they would have to live. And what did they take with them? Family relics, toys, and “useful” household items such as the Great Soviet Encyclopedic Dictionary, wooden spoons, cast-iron skillets, and tablecloths.
I offered playing with these objects, and the owners gladly joined in. Some photographs are composed like a scene on stage, with my subjects as both actors and authors. To inspire them, I became a part of the game myself — I staged a photo session with a pair of high-heeled boots I brought to the USA and never worn them.

I believe that through this project, many of the participants saw their long-cherished items from a new perspective. We played with them, used them out of context, dusted them off, and took them down from their pedestals. And along with that, their memories of the traumatic experience of emigration also received a push toward rethinking. My project encouraged them to look back at those events from afar — from the perspective of their adult, established lives — with humor, and almost without pain.

"I remember when we came to the American embassy — there was an American sitting there. I had seen Americans before, but never that close. And he was sitting with one leg casually crossed over the other — not the way people sit in Russia, but in a very relaxed, easy way. I thought, “Wow, I wonder how different everything will be in America.” Because he was a completely different kind of person, of a completely different kind of presence."

"When we were leaving, you were only allowed to take one suitcase, that was it.

So, there was this dilemma — should we bring my easel? I was twelve. I remember us discussing all the things, and the question kept coming up: “Are we taking the boy’s easel?”

And my uncle, Uncle Yura, said: “Of course! He must step off the plane and down the ramp so everyone can see right away that an artist has arrived.” Well, that settled it. We took the easel, left something else behind.

So that easel, I think, is the only thing I still have — it’s survived for thirty-five years.."

"When people who had been waiting in Italy for months finally got their “transport” (that’s when you were told the exact date of your flight from Italy to America), they had to come out with all their belongings at two in the morning. A bus would pull up to the stop, collect everyone, and take them to the airport. Naturally, people would come out a bit earlier, afraid to miss it. But it was the middle of the night — and sometimes a car would pull up, big Russian-speaking guys would jump out. And since it was clear that no one about to leave would call the police, they’d take jewelry, money, anything valuable.

There were also groups who knew that somebody’s leaving, and they would come out to guard the departing families — protecting them from their own. Still, it was frightening. We stood there at two in the morning, in complete darkness, waiting for the bus. But once we got on, it felt safe. We knew that now everything was fine, because no one robbed you at the airport."