Natura

Political circumstances brought me to Georgia. For 1.5 years, I posed as a model for sculptors - to connect with locals also to escape and change my identity. I realized, that only by accepting my past and roots, I could overcome trauma and move forward.

" I could still feel that optimism vibrating through the decades: that our bodies are full of power, and furthermore that their power is not despite but because of their manifest vulnerabilities."
Olivia Laing. «Everybody».

For a year and a half, I worked as a model in the sculpture workshop of the Tbilisi Academy of Arts. The stillness of my body became a metaphor for my life, frozen at the moment Russia invaded Ukraine and my husband and I moved to Georgia.

In Georgian, Russian, and several other languages, the word "Natura" refers to a model posing for painters and sculptors. In Latin, it means nature. Students observed me, studied me, and sculpted me, perceiving my body as an object of learning. I documented the process and results of our work. By being entirely naked, I showed my openness—a desperate attempt to overcome the alienation of exile and draw closer to others.

My body is my only home. I will hide in it, as if in a shell, among the trees, mountains and caves, among the ancient places of a foreign country. Nature is what is inside me and what surrounds me, it brings peace and consolation. I am a nature frozen in time, a model for creating a sculpture, I am a sculpture myself. I feel connected to all living creatures, but at the same time I feel alone.

I’m trying to integrate into the new world without losing myself, my identity and roots. But who am I? I have character, I must be strong, I must rise up and start moving forward. But for now I look more like a person standing on the station platform while the train rushes past at great speed.