Alexander Anufriev
Alexander Anufriev (born Ukhta). Graduated the Rodchenko School of Photography and Multimedia. Rodchenko (documentary photography). Alexander works on projects that describe the social landscape of modern Russia, creating his own “propaganda” based on three pillars: criticism, absurdity and props. He devotes his projects to things that are often taken for granted: from the features of football fans’ tattoos to portraits of the “last” communists. Lives and works in Moscow.
Publications:
Strelka Mag , British Journal of Photography , L’Obs , It’s Nice That , Repubblica.it , Colta.ru , FK Magazine , Feature Shoot , P3 Publico , Bird in Flight , Bird in Flight , Moslenta
- 2018 – Winner in Publishing and Student Category at PDN Annual
- 2018 – Third place at Moscow Photobookfest
- 2017 – Winner in the student category at PDN Annual
- 2017 – Second Place at Sony World Photography Awards
- 2017 – Nominated “Student Spotlight” LensCulture Exposure Award
- 2017 – Feature Shoot Emerging Photography Winner
- 2015 – Second place at The Student World Biennial
- 2015 – Finalist of the PhotoVisa festival
- 2015 – Laureate of the “Silver Camera”
Group exhibitions:
- 2021 – “Museum of Self-Isolation”. Moscow City Museum. Moscow, Russia.
- 2018 – “The ball is round, the field is even”. VDNKh. Moscow, Russia.
- 2017 – “New Generation of Russian Art”. Krinzinger Projekte Gallery. Vienna, Austria.
- 2017 – Warsaw Photo Days. Sinfonia Varsovia Centrum. Warsaw Poland.
- 2017 – Presence Festival. Photo department. Saint-Petersburg, Russia.
- 2017 – Head On Festival. Paddington Reservoir Gardens. Sydney, Australia.
- 2017 – Diffusion Festival. Wales Millennium Center. Cardiff, UK.
- 2017 – “Eighth Level”. Winery. Moscow, Russia.
- 2017 – “Fashion and Style in Photography”. Central Exhibition Hall Manezh. Moscow, Russia.
- 2016 – “10th Anniversary of the Rodchenko School”. MAMM. Moscow, Russia.
- 2016 – “Another Moscow”. Rodchenko Art School. Moscow, Russia.
- 2016 – “NordArt”. Budelsdorf, Germany.
- 2016 – f / Stop Festival. Leipzig, Germany.
- 2015 – “Silver Camera”. Central Exhibition Hall Manezh. Moscow, Russia.
- 2015 – Curatorial workshop “Triangle”. Moscow, Russia.
- Multimedia Art Museum (Moscow, Russia)
- Moscow Museum of Modern Art (Moscow, Russia)
- NordArt Collection (Buedelsdorf, Germany)
All author's works
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New Moscow
One of the world’s largest megapolises, Moscow, is constantly growing and getting new and affordable housing. Often these districts with newly built houses are lacking the necessary infrastructure, and the marketing promises of developers are shattered by reality. Such desolate sleeping districts require radical ways of settling in. For Alexander Anufriev, who moved into an apartment complex on the outskirts of Moscow in 2016, photography has become a means of interaction and reconciliation with the new reality. The photographer eschews direct social criticism; instead of denunciation, he chooses an exploratory tone. Plunging into the life of his neighborhood, he looks into the faces of his characters, those who moved closer to the capital in search of work and prosperity and started a new life: “I sought to capture the starting point of the settlers’ new life. I am one of them too. To show the state of incompleteness and permanent construction which the neighborhood will be in for years to come. This is why the whole series is shot in the street. It’s a social landscape of our time and of our country, with its vast expanses and the unsettled state of life, its incompleteness and promises.”
Russian Football
Tattoo
Russia hosted the 2018 FIFA World Cup. In anticipation of the grand event, Alexander Anufriev created a series of images dedicated to one of the most numerous subcultures – football fans. The attention of the photographer is fixed on the bodies of Moscow football clubs’ most devoted fans, more precisely, on the football symbols tattooed on them. Large cropping of the faces and smooth black background allow the viewer to fully focus on the tattoo. The tattooed body parts look like a canvas on which the drama of local patriotism and club commitment unfolds. Tattoos are a traditional method of bodily identification and expression of group identity. Anufriev’s project reveals not only their content and sociological, but also plastic and aesthetic components.
Symptoms
To create a portrait of an era is one of the supreme tasks of photography. The human dimension of history is ephemeral: emotional registers, cultural references, status symbols, signs of identity are clear for one generation but are not obvious for the next. In his series Alexander Anufriev synthesizes the symbols or markers of an era, which he calls its “symptoms”. He is particularly interested in affectations inherent in the epoch, that socio-psychological climate which subsequently becomes the basis of a generalized portrait of a certain historical period. The photographer explains it this way: “What kind of feelings do photographs of the Stalinist period evoke in us? Or the Khrushchev Thaw? Emotionally, they are diametrically opposed. This emotional symptom of the time is what interests me the most. The way a nation feels, the prevailing moods and the setting for these moods.” The series brings together images from different genres: social chronicle, staged portrait and reportage. Breaking free from genre frameworks, they allow the emphasis of secondary details and bring forth not verbalized content, but the hard-to-articulate spirit of the age.