Untitled 2 from Tiksi (2010)

In her photographic oeuvre, Evgenia Arbugaeva combines documentary and narrative styles. She often looks to her homeland – the Arctic – discovering and capturing this remote world and the people who inhabit it. Her work portrays personal stories and photo essays in magical realist compositions that are rooted in fairy tale and fable.

Tiksi is a Siberian settlement on the shore of the Arctic Ocean and Evgenia Arbugaeva’s birthplace. Once an important USSR military and scientific base, Tiksi’s community diminished after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Returning for the first time in 2010, Arbugaeva was struck by its decline and set about reclaiming her childhood memories through a series of photographs. Tiksi is a love letter to the past, narrating the adventures of a girl called Tanya, who is a representation of the artist’s younger self. The images capture her playing among candy-coloured houses, snow-capped valleys and the eerie glow of the nightly aurora borealis.

Evgenia Arbugaeva’s series Tiksi relates strongly to The Atkinson’s permanent display about the polar explorer FJ ‘Percy’ Hooper and to the photographs of Southport-born polar photographer Herbert Ponting. In addition, the acquisition sits well with the museum’s collection of self-portraits and autobiographical subject paintings.

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