“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.”
Victor Frankl
The work revolves around the idea of watching and witnessing and the perception of knowing that we are being watched. The body of work is related to Latvian history (focusing on Riga) from 1940 when repression and violence caused by two foreign powers (Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia) escalated in unprecedented magnitude, similar to the other parts of the Baltics and Eastern Europe.
Part 1: To begin, I photographed objects and places around Riga I’ve reimagined that the subjects on my photograph could silently witness historical events and violence that occurred in Riga and give them new metaphorical meanings and context within this work.The portraits connect past and present.
Part 2: Moving on from this I raised and photographed beacons on very sitespecific places around Riga where mass murder and displacements occurs between 1940-1950. The beacon acts as a reminder of violence from a not so distant past but could also be understood as a warning signal that these histories have the potential to be repeated especially in curent political clima.
