New Arrivals MRF

The Museum of Russian Photography systematically collects books, photographs, photographic equipment and household items of photographers of the XIX-XXI centuries. New arrivals are presented in the exhibition hall №5.

Last pagans of Russia Mari in photos by Oleg Ponomarev

Photographer Oleg Ponomarev visited the prayers of the Mari, where he saw the sacrifice happening and heard what the last representatives of the pre-Christian religion in Russia were asking the gods for. Colleagues from the online magazine Bird In Flight publish a photo project by Ponomarev from the Republic of Mari El.

We are moving forward at the beginning of the seventh morning. Around the endless field, the horizon dissolves in thick fog. Turning off the highway, we are attached to the tail of a string of cars. There is no doubt that the destination of all is the same: the most important place for any Mari is the sacred grove Savaran-ot, where today the largest All-Mari prayer will be held today.

Marians belong to the Finno-Ugric group, their number is about 600 thousand people. Most of them live in the Republic of Mari El: in the western part they are mountain mari, in the eastern part they are meadow. Despite the fact that the Mari closely cohabit with other ethnic groups - Russians, Tatars, Udmurts - they managed to preserve their original culture. At the same time, along with the traditional Mari faith in the republic, they also profess Christianity and Islam. Even within the same family, its different generations may hold different religious beliefs.

The basis of the Mari faith is unity with nature, an understanding of the fact that by nature one cannot take more than it gives. For example, according to their traditions, it is forbidden to cut trees, even dried ones, in holy places. The villagers will wait until the tree itself falls, take it in their hands and carry it to the forest so that it rotted and goes to the earth to the gods.

Alice's Journey to Petersburg Photos from the Cheshire Landscape series by Nadezhda Kuznetsova

Nadezhda Kuznetsova with her original technique, a special look, embodied in the now famous series, quickly entered the circle of the leading photographers of St. Petersburg. She is an artist who not only uses photography in her work, but also works a lot and fruitfully in the photographic genre: she takes pictures, writes a photograph, from a photograph, inside a photograph. Having a classical art education and experience in teaching composition and graphics in the St. Petersburg Art and Industry Academy. She is balancing on the border of a graphic and photographic image. Her individual search is interesting in the context of an intensive search for her own language of digital photography, which persistently today refuses the analog image, replacing it with a man-made image ...

fragment of article by Valery Savchuk

"Botanical Garden". 2006                                      "Door". 2006