Ludmila [Still 1], 2018
Color HD Video
Run Time: 01:49
https://vimeo.com/686049057
How does one reconcile the innocence of childhood with the brutal reality of war? In this video, the Russian alphabet is spoken while photos of things that correspond to the letter being spoken are shown over photos from World War II.
Ludmila [Still 2], 2018
Color HD Video
Run Time: 01:49
https://vimeo.com/686049057
How does one reconcile the innocence of childhood with the brutal reality of war? In this video, the Russian alphabet is spoken while photos of things that correspond to the letter being spoken are shown over photos from World War II.
Pirozhki [Still 1], 2021
Color Video
Run Time: 01:15
https://vimeo.com/654631021
Inspired by the intersection of my grandmother's Russian cooking and her love for American snacks, this video finds a woman trying to prepare pirozhkis for a special occasion but she ultimately fails. She decides to bring pop-tarts to her company which is revealed to be the mascot of Russia, a bear.
Pirozhki [Still 2], 2021
Color Video
Run Time: 01:15
https://vimeo.com/654631021
Inspired by the intersection of my grandmother's Russian cooking and her love for American snacks, this video finds a woman trying to prepare pirozhkis for a special occasion but she ultimately fails. She decides to bring pop-tarts to her company which is revealed to be the mascot of Russia, a bear.
Fyodor [Still 1], 2022
Color Video
Run Time: 01:35
https://vimeo.com/695059927
In this video, a woman finds an ottoman with a face on the underside. Thinking it is the face of her father, she brings it a flower which flies away. The video follows the journey of the flower and reveals things about her fathers life.
Fyodor [Still 2], 2022
Color Video
Run Time: 01:35
https://vimeo.com/695059927
In this video, a woman finds an ottoman with a face on the underside. Thinking it is the face of her father, she brings it a flower which flies away. The video follows the journey of the flower and reveals things about her fathers life.
How reliable am I as a narrator? By tackling the story of my grandmother without having access to her, I rely on the memories I have of her which are getting fainter and fainter as time goes on. I wonder what I will never know and how much I can fill in the blanks.
Through the medium of animation, specifically stop motion, I am capturing her tense relationship with The Soviet Union and her immigration to America from Russia after World War II. Animation allows for non-linear storytelling similar to how I’m discovering her stories. I knew my grandmother primarily through her house in Washington, D.C. – the house where my mother and her siblings grew up and, later, I would spend the majority of my childhood. While spending time with her, I began to observe different aspects of how she organized her rooms.
Using her house as a point of research I started to question how she balanced her Russian identity with her newfound American identity. How did she keep her Russianness despite wanting to rid herself of it as well?
Through my own memories and talking to my mother, I will create a series of animated sequences that all take place around my grandmother’s house, encapsulating both the pain stored in the deepest places of herself and her home but also the peace she got out of the rituals that made up her days. This research will culminate in a mixed media installation, combining my research with a curated selection of my grandmother’s belongings and a stop motion animation video.