My work about the Chechen poet Arbi Mamakayev began with visit to an art residence in the North Caucasus. He was born in 1918 in Chechen-Ingush ASSR.
In 1941 Arbi was sent to Magadan on denunciation, where he remained for 15 years, until 1956. He returned home in 1957, but he died only a year later, in 1958.
The poet left behind his Magadan’s album of images, letters to his son, second wife Maya, and friends I understood that most of mine letters, photos, and documents are digital. But our paths (mine and Arby) unexpectedly intersected at one point. This work is a reflection on the ways to remember, store and reproduce events of the past.
What digital traces do we leave now by which we will be recognised in the future. This work is a dialogue between me and Arbi Mamakayev, in which I give him a voice in the present, putting into the digital space. And fall into his narrative of the past.
