In Search of Anna (2021)

Anna Karenina is one of the most famous images of Russian culture — the image of a woman who threw herself under an approaching train because of unhappy love. The suicide of a woman in love, which forced in her passion to resist the standards of her time, served as a spectacular denouement of the famous novel by Leo Tolstoy.

Once in Yasnaya Polyana, the Tolstoy family estate, I’ve found out that one of the heroine’s prototype was Anna Pirogova, a housekeeper and a lover of the landlord Alexandr Bibikov, who was Tolstoy’s neighbour. Unable to withstand the betrayal of her lover, she threw herself under the train. The headstone of Anna Pirogova is located on the territory of the Tolstoy family necropolis, next to the graves of Bibikov, his first and second wives.

Anna Karenina had other real prototypes as well. These were famous ladies of that time, their images — photographic and pictorial — are easily found in open sources. And only a portrait of Anna Pirogova is impossible to find. There is just a short entry with a description of her that is left in the diary of Tolstoy’s wife.

The image of Anna Karenina has been reproduced and interpreted for many times. There are dozens of film adaptations, theatrical performances, musicals. Using photography, created and found, I want to separate the fictional image from the real woman. But she eludes me. With each photo taken, she goes further and further. There are words in my head that sound: “What if there is still hope for another outcome… No, everything must disappear: both the body and the image”. The next moment everything was dissolved into a lingering locomotive groan.