AutoHerbarium
gardening oneself into a new land
Both photography and poetry for me is a process of talking to the spirit of a place and doing something for it. I work with objects found on the ground, part of this land, respecting their nature, creating living collages-amulets to the space, weaving both self-portraits and portraits of people into this interaction with the place.
I work more intuitively, and then, having created, I interpret what I have created, unravelling what it means — this is close to the work of pythias and diviners in ancient temples: one conveyed the will of the gods in a metaphorical sense, the other interpreted it to the questioner. Art for me is about that.
In the process I often imprint myself into a place too, making multi-exposure self-portraits; it’s not about ‘taking a prettier picture’, it’s about me and nature and the city and other people and mixing — like atoms mixing somewhere at the core of everything.
This is my way of blending into the soil and not dying, but sprouting a new one. To mingle with the local earth. Persephone’s way through the black, to make my way back. To grow.
Russia-United Kingdom, 2022-ongoing
Viktoriia Road
My name is Victoria Dini. But in my official documents, I am listed as Viktoriia due to Russian rules of transcription. And there’s the law in Britain: all must be named the same way. It is called “the requiring consistency between official documents”. That’s why my British ID turns my quite British name to be written not correctly.
As I walk through the streets of London, I see them all written by my name as a spell, a magic spell. But mine’s not working. It feels like something holding me back. Or is it my legacy, huh?
Call me by my name, but what is mine, I need to figure it out. It is lost in translation. Somedays I think maybe it can become my own magic spell
2
I work with identity as a micro-model of space
and in emigration, it became clear that my primary identity is a bookish
and my entire childhood was woven from translated books, mostly English
so I came to a strange land for the first time — but it turns out to be my native land, like forgotten fairy tales, like a child’s cradle
I came here literally knowing nothing about it in reality, but yet I KNOW
3
Red, Royal Mail Red, the colour of buses and fire hydrants.
Bright in summer and deeply warming in winter like fire.
People-drivers on buses raise their hand, saying goodbye to the people-passengers, at each station.
People-passengers raise their hand at stops to let the bus in. Those are the rules.
I raise my hand,
to touch
4
“Did you know that there are tribes where they believe that a person is reborn in the course of life? They even give themselves new names.”
5
I feel so blessed here, in the Mother of Myths, in the Nature of my childhood books, in the place which I never expected to see and still so familiar
So close, so native
I weave myself into your herbs and walls, earth and air like a braid
Let my tongue praise your language
my country of blood is Ukraine, my country of born is Moldova, my country of raise is Russia
my country of home is books and visions
and I tell you the story in my native from the no-belonger
AutoHerbarium
И фотография, и поэзия для меня — это процесс общения с духом места и создания чего-то для него, вместе с ним. Я работаю с предметами, найденными на земле, частью этой земли, уважая их природу, создавая живые коллажи-амулеты для пространства, вплетая в это взаимодействие с местом как автопортреты, так и портреты людей.
Я работаю интуитивно, а потом, создав, интерпретирую созданное, разгадывая его смысл — это близко к работе пифий и прорицателей в древних храмах: один передавал волю богов в метафорическом смысле, другой интерпретировал ее для вопрошающего. Искусство для меня — это именно это.
В процессе работы я часто впечатываю себя в место тоже, делая мультиэкспозиционные автопортреты; это не про “снять покрасивей”, это про меня и природу и город и других людей и смешение — как смешиваются где-то в основе всего сущего атомы.
Это мой способ смешаться с землей и не умереть, а прорасти новой. Смешаться с местной землей. Персефоний путь через черное, пробиваться обратно.
