Satellites: Photographs from the Fringes of the Former Soviet Union

by Jonas Bendiksen

This culmination of a fascinating seven-year photographic journey takes viewers through the countries and enclaves once held in orbit by the immense gravity of Moscow, the nucleus of the Soviet empire. Now each region is on its own in a chaotic political environment, sometimes without diplomatic recognition from neighbors, much less the international community. Abkhazia, an unrecognized country on the Black Sea, was once the natural pearl of the empire, where bellicose generals and productive factory managers came to relax. The spacecraft crash zones between Russia and Kazakhstan reveal a Soviet-inflected version of the entrepreneurial spirit. In Transdniester, a breakaway region of Moldova that survives by functioning as a giant black market for illicit traffic in all manner of goods, from leftover Soviet munitions to bootlegged booze, Bendiksen was expelled on the grounds that he was a "protagonist in an international spy ring." These 62 hauntingly beautiful and often arresting color photographs unsentimentally reveal the often grim circumstances in these half-forgotten regions, uniformly poor and polluted, and often politically unstable. We may not hear much about them today, but we will certainly hear more as the fall of the Iron Curtain continues to reverberate throughout the region.

Genres: Photography, Art, Russia

152 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2006

Reviews

[Amund Ose-Johansen · Rating 5 out of 5]

His images from the former Soviet Union is superb. He also writes well of the places he visited

[Nordia · Rating 3 out of 5]

The cover picture alone is worth the book. Interspersed throughout are some pretty awesome pictures, and a brief summary of sometimes forgotten countries that exist as "satellites" of the current Russia, former USSR.

[Trui · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most fascinating photo books I ever saw. The images, the stories, the concept, the graphic design, everything.
A collector's item now, and I dearly hold onto my copy which I received as a very special present for a very special birthday in Istanbul (of all places...).