RUS, 2005
The relationship between people and the environment looks different in the East than in the West. The West sees the environment in which we reside and move as an extension of ourselves, so when we sweep the street, clean the windows, those activities come from the same need and will as when we put on a clean shirt or a neatly ironed dress. The environment leaves someone from the East cold.
He does not even try to give it refinement, shine, aesthetic quality. He throws the dirt directly in front of his house, he throws the washing water out through his window. The concept of conservation, cleaning, polishing, painting is foreign to him. His contact with things is one-off. For example, he puts up a fence. Later the fence breaks, it rot, collapses – that no longer interests people from the East. He sees no connection between the quality of his own life and the quality of his own environment. The world of dirt and neglect begins right on the edge of his skin.
There are two Russian realities: the mythical, philosophical, spiritual, the higher, and at the same time the reality of rudeness, badness and filth proliferates. And in between – where is the interface? Where are the connections, links, bridges? But only those two realities together make up Russia, which is one and indivisible.
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