Anastasia Samoylova
FLOODZONE
A tourist paradise, a booming real estate market and luxurious residences right by the ocean, but also tidal storm surges, an overflowing sewer system and climate gentrification: Miami is a glamorous dream city, but due to climate change it is also one of the most vulnerable coastal cities in the world. The rise in sea levels has had all sorts of repercussions on everyday life. For four years now, Anastasia Samoylova has been capturing her dissonant impressions on her strolls through the sprawling city. The photographs do not feature any disaster scenarios, the artist preferring instead to work with subtler references. Reality and appearance, destruction and poetry make for close bedfellows. Samoylova effortlessly blends lyrical documentary photography with staged photographs, allegorical images, and shots that defy clichés. FloodZone (since 2016) draws on the artist’s keen and long-standing interest in the differences between natural and constructed landscapes and the role that the medium of photography plays in elaborating collective memory and imagined geographies. Her highly aesthetic yet unsettling photographs depict the precarious state of affairs of a reality wavering between the paradisiac and the catastrophic.
Anastasia Samoylova, born 1984, lives in Miami, USA.
Artist Statement
"I am addressing the issues of urban planning, climate gentrification, and climate anxiety."
Anastasia Samoylova, artist