Anastasia Samoylova, FLORIDAS

Описание: Floridas
Anastasia Samoylova
Video by Fredi Ferrara

Comprising a selection of works from her photographic project: Floridas, the exhibition showcases a new body of work which depicts the state of Florida as a nuanced portrait of the contemporary United States and tests for endurance the narratives of the iconic American Dream.

Sunshine State. Swampland paradise. Tourist aspiration. Political swing-state. Real estate racket. Refuge of excess. Sub-tropical fever dream. With forms of nature and culture found nowhere else, Florida is unique. It is also among the most elusive and misunderstood of places.

Florida has a reputation across the United States and internationally as an extremist place of extravagance, indulgence, hedonistic tourism, and sunny retirement, but the reality is very different. Its politics and culture are as mixed as its demographics, in this, it has become a microcosm of the divisions and differences of the USA as a whole. “I believe that what is happening in the extremes of Florida is happening across the country,” recounts the artist.

Anastasia Samoylova traverses Florida on intensive, wandering road trips from the Keys to the borders with Alabama and Georgia. She creates acutely observed photographs that distill our contradictions and confusions, looking for unexpected resonances in familiar motifs. The images are visually striking but complex, with subtle references both to Florida’s conflicted history and to the way it has been imaged so intensively by others. Her wide-ranging project Floridas takes its inspiration from Walker Evans, the American photographer who documented the state between the 1930s and the 1970s. Like Evans, Samoylova moves between color and black and white, looking closely at the telling details in landscapes, cityscapes, people, objects, and interiors that speak volumes about the culture and social values.

For Samoylova, photography is a uniquely placed to communicate with a braod audience, opening up questions in accessible ways beyond the usual audiences for art. Her images have multiple entry points to their layered meanings, making them accessible to viewers from diverse backgrounds with different perspectives and expectations.

A book published by Steidl and edited by David Campany, including the images of Floridas and a selection of Walker Evans’ photographs, was recently released.

Anastasia Samoylova (b. 1984) is a Russian-American artist who moves between observational photography and studio practice. Her work explores notions of environmentalism, consumerism and the picturesque. She investigates and evidence the complex relationship between the nature and human society. Samoylova’s photography plays around the collective memories and the narratives of geography. Samoylova received her MFA from Bradley University and MA in Environmental Design from the Russian State University for the Humanities. In 2021 Samoylova won the first edition of the KBr Photo Award. Recent exhibitions include Eastman Museum; Chrysler Museum of Art; The Photographer's Gallery; Kunst Haus Wien; History Miami Museum; and Museum of Fine Arts, Le Locle.

In 2022 Samoylova was shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize. Her work is included in the permanent collections at the Perez Art Museum Miami and Museum of Contemporary Photography Chicago, among others. Published monographs include Floridas (Steidl, 2022) and FloodZone (Steidl, 2019)