Temporarily available: Winter Print 2023
the sochi project shop print offer
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of 92-year old Nikoloz Charashvili at Vake Park in Tbilisi, Georgia, is now available for only 175 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 31 March 2023 (or sold out). Prints will be shipped with a signed and numbered certificate of authenticity in April 2023.
Title: Nikoloz Charashvili, Tbilisi, Georgia, 2013
Print technique: Analogue handmade C-print
Paper size: 36 x 42 cm (14.2 x 16.5 in) / Image 30 x 36 cm
Temporarily available: Autumn Print 2022
shop print offer the sochi project
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of six-year old Kamila at school in the North Caucasian republic of Dagestan is now available for only 175 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 31 December 2022 (or sold out). Prints will be shipped in January 2023.
PS: The Summer Print 2022 is still available until 1 October 2022. Please click on the link.
Temporarily available: Summer Print 2022
print offer shop the sochi project
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of a residential block in Sukhum, Abkhazia is now available for only 169 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 30 September 2022 (or sold out). Prints will be shipped in October 2022.
In early spring, a low-hanging sun casts its evening light on residential blocks in the centre of Sukhum, the capital of Abkhazia. In the distance, snowy peaks of Caucasus foothills can be seen. This tiny subtropical country on the Black Sea was once the Riviera of the Soviet Union. Sanatoriums and hotels stood shoulder to shoulder, like palaces for the proletariat. Stalin had no less than two dachas there…
Temporary 20% discount on The Europeans works
print offer the europeans the naval base
By purchasing a work in edition from The Europeans, you are supporting our project in a very essential way. This work from The Naval Base, our previous chapter within The Europeans, is offered at a discounted price until 1 August 2022. From each chapter within The Europeans, two defining works are chosen and offered at a 20% discount for a period of three months. The framed works measure 42 x 51 cm (16 1/2 x 20 inch) in an edition of 7 copies.
Temporarily available: Spring Print 2022
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of a beach guest in holiday resort Loo in Russia is now available for only 169 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 30 June 2022 (or sold out). Prints will be shipped in July 2022.
In the summer of 2011, writer Arnold van Bruggen and I travelled by train from beach to beach along the endless coastal strip around the Russian resort of Sochi. In the evenings we visited restaurants to portray the karaoke singer on duty for our book Sochi Singers. During the day, I photographed people on the beach. Not exactly my favourite thing to do. I always feel terribly awkward between all those half-naked sweating and frequently drunk people. This young lady strolled casually towards me on the pebble beach of Loo. My question whether I could photograph her was redundant. One click. Off she went.
LAST THREE DAYS: Winter Print 2022
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of a young ballet dancer in Sochi is now available for only 169 euros excluding framing and shipping. This offer runs until 31 March 2022 (or sold out).
Over the past weeks, newspapers in the Netherlands have been littered with stories about the Russian star ballerina Olga Smirnova, who spoke out against the war in Ukraine after which she fled from Moscow and joined the Dutch National Ballet in Amsterdam. Just like Dasha in this picture, she probably made her first ballet steps in an old, cosy local Dom Kultury. I made this portrait of Dasha in 2009 at the Dom Kultury in Sochi, where I shot a whole series of portraits with my large format camera. Until 1 April you can buy a carefully produced analog print. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. After that, the photo will never be reprinted.
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of a young wrestler in small village near Grozny in the North Caucasian Republic of Chechnya is now available for only 169 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 31 December 2021 (or sold out).
Wrestling and the North Caucasus are inextricably linked. Not only is wrestling the most popular sport in the region, it is also the birthplace of many Olympic champions. A wrestling coach once explained it to us as follows: "If a boy starts wrestling at seven or eight, he does so as a serious man. It's not just a game, but a serious fight between two men. Serious because the whole upbringing and education system here is serious. If you're 14, then you need to be a fighter. You should be aware of that when you watch a wrestling match between two boys."
Temporarily available:
Summer Print 2021
shop print offer
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of Sergey Ivanovich in 2003 is now available for only 159 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 30 September 2021 (or sold out).
Former pilot Sergey Ivanovich - ninety-one years old - is practically suffocating under the weight of the many decorations on his jacket. He is standing in his living room in the heavily nuclear contaminated village of Argayash in Russia. As part of my graduation project at the art academy in Utrecht, I travelled in 2003 with medium and large format camera through the Chelyabinsk region in Russia. This region is heavily polluted as a result of a nuclear accident that took place in 1957 in the Mayak Production Facility…
Sprint Print 2021
print offer shop 101 billionaires
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of a retired MIG-23 next to the Victory Museum in Angarsk (2008) is now available for only 159 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 30 June 2021 (or sold out).
In January 2008, far away in an ice-cold Siberia, I was working on 101 Billionaires. In the city of Angarsk, I had arranged to visit the Victory Museum with a WWII veteran (the museum is visible on the right). In the small courtyard next to the museum, a retired MIG-23 is somewhat forlornly displayed. It was parked there for unknown reasons in 1990, after 18 years of service. Traces of vandalism - or resistance - were visible already: Graffiti, a smashed cockpit and some ripped-off sheet metal.
Winter Print 2021
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of a rocket in a park in Cherkessk (2008) is now available for only 158 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 31 March 2021 (or sold out).
Together with Dutch journalist Jelle Brandt Corstius and a dramatic hangover I stroll through a typical huge Soviet city park called Zelyony Ostrov (Green Island). We are in Cherkessk, the capital of the North Caucasian republic of Karachay-Cherkessia. "Even for a small nation, the history of the Karachays is not very cheerful", Jelle writes back home in his book about different small nations. Although it is summery and hot as hell, most attractions are out of service. Undoubtedly this has something to do with the technical state they are in.
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of a roundabout in Karachayevsk in 2008 is now available for only 158 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 31 December 2020 (or sold out).
When we talk about the North Caucasus, most people think of republics like Chechnya, Dagestan or North Ossetia. Karachay-Cherkessia is less known. In 2008 I travelled to Karachay-Cherkessia together with Dutch journalist Jelle Brandt Corstius in order to understand more about small peoples with exotic names like the Karachays, the Cherkess, the Abazins, the Nogais and here and there some Kumyks. The latter live mainly in Dagestan, however they share the same incomprehensible language as the Karachays.
On the first day we pass Karachayevsk, the capital of the Karachay part, where mainly Islamic Karachays live. We shortly visit the mosque, which has just been completed. That turns out to be a good decision. While Jelle is listening to the imam talking about the brand-new chandelier made in China, I photograph the stunning view of the adjoining roundabout that connects three roads to different peoples.
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of Mikhail Filipovich Frolov in Sochi is now available for only 158 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 30 September 2020 (or sold out).
Mikhail Filipovich Frolov, eighty-eight years old, grew up in Minsk and later in Siberian Krasnoyarsk. "I grew up in freezing cold. When I was sent to the Polish front during the Great Patriotic War, I was used to it. Soldiers who grew up in Azerbaijan had a fever more quickly". After being wounded four times during the war, Frolov served in the army until he was 39 years old. He was able to retire thanks to the right connections. "I always dreamed of staying and growing old in Siberia, until I discovered the beauty of Sochi during a stay in a sanatorium. The trees are more beautiful here than in Siberia." Frolov has been living permanently in Sochi since the early 1980s.
Spring Print 2020
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of school children in Krasny Vostok is now available for only 158 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 30 June 2020 (or sold out).
I took this photo of schoolchildren after lunch during our first visit to Krasny Vostok in 2009. It is one of the last pictures before we were evicted from the village. While it started as a promising day. After an extensive tour by a talkative WWII veteran in the local school museum we were told that the harvest festival was about to start. Around us children were running around dressed as cucumbers, onions and carrots. Until a typical math teacher - colouring glasses and sweat stains under the armpits - angrily walks at the principal and swears that foreigners are not allowed to be in the school building. The principal calls the mayor, the mayor calls local authorities, local authorities call Moscow and the final answer is always: Get out! And thus a positive story about the difficult resurrection of an energetic village with cheerful children changed again into a story about Russian paranoia and xenophobia.
Winter Print 2020 (sold out)
print offer russia shop
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of former lieutenant colonel of the KGB Nikolay Felipovich Khokhlov is now available for only 158 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 31 March 2020 (or sold out).
Nikolay Felipovich Khokhlov - 89 years old - has worked for the secret service all of his working life. He started at a young age during the Second World War, where he visited hospitals in the region around Krasnoyarsk searching for soldiers who had injured themselves on the way to the front in order to avoid the war. During his career with the KGB he was promoted to lieutenant colonel and transferred to Sochi. There he became responsible for spying on foreigners. "If you'd walked around Sochi at that time, you can be sure I'd have been watching you every minute of every day," he laughs.
shop print offer russia
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of a girl in a kommunalka in Chelyabinsk is now available for only 150 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 31 December 2019. ⁠
In 2003 I travelled for a month across Chelyabinsk region in the Russian Ural. Andrey, a befriended student who often accompanied me, took me to his family in a typical kommunalka; an apartment building where several families share one apartment. Everywhere people were hanging around in dark corridors and haphazardly I started making portraits of whoever I met.
Donation to WECF from the proceeds of sold Summer Prints 2019
donation print offer russia
On each sold Summer Print 2019, I had promised that I would donate 10 euros to Women Engage for a Common Future (WECF), a NGO that support local activists and stands for an ecofeminist tomorrow. Thanks to a sold-out Summer Print, I was able to donate 250 euros today.
More about WECF
Only 4 left:
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This exclusive handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of Nikolay Semilitov in Muslyumovo in Russia is now available for only 150 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25.
In 2004 I graduated with a book entitled 'Communism & Cowgirls'. On the back of the book was this portrait of Nikolay Andreyevich Semilitov, which I made of him with my large-format camera while he patiently waited on the side of his bed. He lived in a small one-room apartment in Muslyumovo, one of the villages I visited in the region that had been severely affected by nuclear pollution.
Spring Print 2019 (sold out)
iceland print offer shop
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This exclusive handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of Sverrir's garden in Iceland is now available for only 150 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 30 June 2019. Update: Sold out!
I took this picture in 2005 at the Holmur farm when I was working on the series Roots of the Rúntur. The owner of the dilapidated estate is sixty-six-year-old Sverrir Valdimarsson. He is proud of the long family history of the estate and sees it as his duty to preserve it for the future.
print offer shop
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This exclusive handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of boys listening to music next to their Lada is now available for only 150 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 31 March 2019.
In 2007 I traveled to Abkhazia for the first time, together with colleagues #tomaskaan and @arnold_vanbruggen. A bit lost we walk around in the center of the capital Sukhumi. Now and then a car screeches past. There is no middle ground between luxury Mercedes and BMWs, and the most dilapidated Ladas, Volgas and trolley buses. A group of boys is hanging around an old Lada. Loud music emanates from the sound system. 'We don't have much else to do,' they say. 'Sukhumi is deadly boring.'
print offer the sochi project shop
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This exclusive handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm) of children in a refugee shelter in Ingushetia is now available for only 148 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 31 December 2018.
Milana, Rizvan, and Ravida were born as refugees. Their father fled from the Prigorodny District in North Ossetia to Ingushetia and found shelter in a communal building that had previously housed prisoners carrying out community service. The other refugees are slowly drifting away, allowing the Dezaurov family to take over their vacant rooms instead of being confined to the single room in which they had lived until recently.
Summer Print 2018 runs until
the unknown print offer shop
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This exclusive handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm) of a frozen vessel in Siberia is now available for only 148 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 30 September 2018.
The Summer Print 2018 features two girls portrayed in a park in Chelyabinsk at the end of May 2003. I was there to produce a series for my Graduation from the art academy. A selection of that work has been published in my graduation book Communism & Cowgirls. Recently, for the first time in fifteen years, I started looking back at that archive. The largest part of the work consists of portraits of unknown people in the public space. Together with Kominek Books I am working on compiling a selection from this archive, which we want to publish in a book titled The Unknown. This photo is part of that selection.
shop print offer 101 billionaires
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This exclusive handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm) of a frozen vessel in Siberia is now available for only 148 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 30 June 2018.
The Spring Print of a frozen vessel is made early 2008 in the bend of river Angara that meanders through the Siberian city of Irkutsk. Irkutsk is the most important economic centre in East Siberia and famous for the Trans-Siberian Railway that stops here. Ten years ago, I travelled to the Russian Urals and Siberia, among other places, as part of my project 101 Billionaires. Far away from the glitter and glamour of Moscow, 101 Billionaires portrayed the vast majority of other Russia.
Update June 13, 2018: The Spring Print sold out.
shop the sochi project print offer
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This exclusive handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm) of young wrestlers in Abkhazia is now available for only 145 euros excluding framing and shipping. Once the season is over, the image is no longer reprinted. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. This offer runs until 31 March 2018.
Wrestling is not only popular in the North Caucasus, but also in neighboring Abkhazia. These boys train in a room in the cultural centre of Tkuarchal. If they aspire to international competitions, the question remains whether they can ever participate under their own Abkhazian flag. The Olympics authorities have forbidden Abkhazian athletes from competing under their own colors.
Update February 9, 2018: The Winter Print sold out.
Autumn 2017 Print
shop print offer man next door
LIMITED TIME PRINT OFFER: This exclusive handmade analogue c-print (36 x 42 cm / 14.2 x 16.5 in) of Kids house pet on his bed is temporarily available for only 145 euros excluding framing and shipping. This offer runs until 31 December 2017. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25.
My neighbour Kid – the subject of my new project Man Next Door – was a huge animal lover. He lost his beloved pit bull after it viciously attacked someone and had to be put down. When his wife left him, he stayed on in the house with his other great loves: two ball pythons named Kleintje and Pikachu. The snakes only needed food every 40 days. He usually fed them in their terrarium, but he also liked letting them loose on his sofa or bed where, if it was feeding time, he gave them live mice and rats. Kid never felt sorry for the rat: "Basically, he presses him to death immediately. More or less."
shop print offer sochi singers
Without doubt my favorite vodka-soaked evening while photographing Sochi Singers in 2011 was in restaurant Lilya in Lazarevskaya, where Dimitry Bum performed the song 'Digi Digi'. Despite the English lyrics, the song is wildly popular all over the Caucasus. Actually, we have never heard the song outside the Caucasus. Please click on the link below to see a video of Dimitry performing 'Digi Digi'.
Until October 1, 2017, an analogue handmade c-print of this work can be purchased for only 145 euros excluding framing and shipping. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. Once the season is over, the print will no longer be reprinted.
Now available: Spring Print 2017
By accident I stumbled into Cement Town in 2007, a small suburb of the East Siberian industrial city Angarsk. Several times I went to cultural center Druzhba, a dilapidated building in Cement Town that once must have been a great and sparkling Soviet palace. This girl was sitting next to the dance floor during the Friday night disco, while DJ Artiom played deafening electro-house for a crowd of 30 residents.
Until July 1, 2017, an analogue c-print of this work can be purchased for only 145 euros excluding framing and shipping. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. Once the season is over, the print will no longer be reprinted.
Additional option after purchase of a Season Print: Mounting and framing
Following the quick sale of Winter prints, there were several requests if the work could be framed. The answer is yes. We looked for a durable system and an appropriate price. The additional cost for mounting on 1 mm aluminum and framing including anti-reflex, UV protective glass is 115 euros (including VAT). Shipping is not recommended due to the risk of breaking glass. Pick up from my studio in Utrecht is possible by appointment.
Of course you can also still order this analog c-print without framing. Better be quick. There are currently 4 prints left of the ballet class and 11 days to go.
Now available: Winter Print 2017
The new season print is now available. Until April 1, 2017, an analogue c-print of this work can be purchased for only 145 euros excluding framing and shipping. The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25. Once the season is over, the print will no longer be reprinted.
A new initiative:
Season Print offer
My first day to commemorate the Victory of the Great Patriotic War (WWII) took place on May 9, 2003 in Chelyabinsk. I had just landed for the first time in Russia and had no idea what was going to happen. Fortunately I had taken my large format camera that day in the hope that I could take some portraits on the streets. It happened to be a photographers paradise. Proud personalities in magnificent uniforms against wonderful backgrounds. I repeatedly had to change my films outside, with sweaty hands in a light-tight changing bag. Many of the portraits taken on that day - including this lady - ended up in my first book Communism & Cowgirls.
Until January 1, 2017, this analogue c-print can be purchased for only 145 euros (excluding frame and shipping). The number of buyers determines the print run, up to a maximum of 25.
print offer