LIMBO

In Dima Ptitsin’s practices, the construction of scenes featuring a person—be it a punk, a child, a homeless individual, a worker, a passerby, etc.—usually takes center stage. This is followed by the moderation of the scene through fetishized objects and the chosen photographic zone, textual insertions, and artifacts, as well as moderation through a fragmented body positioned in non-standard or marginal situations. These photographs speak to the social status of certain groups of people, subcultures, ways of living in the moment, specific traits, signs, and exist in the realm of surreal outsiderism and provincial absurdity.

In the series “Limbo, ” the strategy changes; a negative event emerges. Here, the positions of the artist and viewer shift, with the background becoming deeply black, almost an abyss. The author becomes an object of dissection, while the viewer takes on the role of the artist with an optical aim. In this sense, the photographs are mirrored and create a space for the viewer in which it is possible to imagine oneself in these or other narratives.

The method of constructing scenes with found objects and actions remains. While fetishized objects in portraits of other people serve more as aesthetic details that highlight, conceptualize, and refine themselves as artworks, in this series, they also act as signals of capitalist reality intertwined with fantasies of desire for satisfaction, tranquility, and their impossible realization.

By adding categories of the divine (limbo) to the title, the artist imbues the language with poetic qualities, hyperbolizes the series of images, and anticipates a situation where the viewer encounters a sacred lyrical subject who cannot escape from everyday life.

Curator and text —  Ilya Mikheev
Samara 2023