Land of Coal
This project explores everyday life in Kuzbass (the Kuznetsk Coal Basin) — one of the largest coal-mining regions in the world, where towns and settlements exist within an industrial landscape.
Over the past two decades, coal production in Russia has increased significantly, with most of it now carried out through open-pit mining. Open pits are moving closer to residential areas, and settlements are becoming enclosed between them.
Coal here becomes part of the living environment: dust hangs in the air, settles on surfaces, penetrates homes, grits between the teeth, and is felt with every breath. Waste heaps can smolder for years, releasing toxic substances. This is not an event, but an everyday condition for local residents.
I am interested in how a sense of normality is formed under these conditions. How people relate their lives to a space where the boundary between safe and unsafe is blurred. Many do not leave — not only because of their attachment to the place, but because they have no real possibility to do so. Housing near open-pit mines is extremely cheap, making it almost impossible to sell and relocate to another region.
The project is built on observing the coexistence of people and coal extraction, homes and open pits, survival and the gradual degradation of the environment. It is a story about life where adaptation becomes the primary mode of existence.
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