Kuim / Hunger and the Death of the Village,
independent multidisciplinary research project, 2024

I grew up in a city, but my roots are in northern villages, among the Pomors who live along rivers and the sea. As a child, I never thought that there had once been hunger here—these places seemed endlessly rich with nature’s gifts. But one day, I learned that in the 1930s, people in my ancestors’ village were starving. That became a turning point for me.

I started researching why northern villages, surrounded by forests, rivers, and the sea, had been so helpless in the face of famine. Collectivization, wars, and climate change were just fragments of a much larger process. The state gradually stripped people of their ability to survive without it—banning foraging, destroying traditions, and fostering dependence on stores, institutionalized medicine, and centralized food supplies.

I see foraging not just as a way to obtain food but as a way to restore my connection to the land, to the place I live, to the history of my people. Foraging makes me a part of my environment, rather than just a consumer of it. It is not just a skill but an act of resistance, a means of overcoming the traumas inflicted by colonization and modern systems of control.

In this project, I explore how the loss of foraging knowledge made us vulnerable and seek ways to reclaim it. I believe that foraging is not the past—it is the future. It allows us to be free and to rebuild networks of mutual aid, where we can exist without fear of hunger and dependence on others’ decisions.

In collaboration with Marya Vershinina

The artistic field research project «Ray-tsentr», 2021-2022 (in Russian, the title plays on words and can be read both as «district center» and «paradise – center») was carried out at the ARKA Center for Contemporary Art (Arkhangelsk). The research covered more than eight different geographical locations in the Arkhangelsk region, varying in terms of territory, economy, history, and other aspects.

The aim of the project was to explore artistic initiatives in the region, establish grassroots communication between artists, identify creative working methods, gather information on artists’ needs and challenges, and collaboratively seek sources of inspiration within these locations.

Participants in the research included:

Vanya Mishin – researcher (conducting interviews, organizing expeditions, finding informants and institutions, coordinating the process, curating the artistic section)
Ivan Lyagachyov, Andrey Borodashkin – artists and assistants (documentation (photo, audio, video), support)
Kristina Dryagina, Natalya Shchukina, Anna Khorishko – ARKA CCA team (management, financing, space, support)