The House That My Grandfather Built

• Prize
  Bronze in Book/Documentary
• Photographer
  Ksenia (Xenia) Nikolskaya
• Agency / Studio
  Xenia Nikolskaya Photography
• Photo Date
  2010-18

In 1955 my grandfather bought a piece of land and built the house where I grown up as a child. Two years before that he came back from Kolyma where he spent 20 years in GULAG as a political prisoner. His wife, my grandmother went after him and started to work as a geologist. In the Soviet Union it wasn’t customary to share family lore, especially if it differs from the norm. One hand it is an ordinary house, but it is also the hero of the history of my family, which has been unfolding for several generations. In my book I collected the documents, archival pictures and my own photographs.