Born in Tver in 1986, Irina Popova grew up amid the upheavals of post-Soviet Russia. She began working as a journalist and photographer at sixteen, and won her first prize a year later. After studying for a time under press photographer Sergey Maximishin in St Petersburg, she found herself in the Caucasus in 2008 when war broke out between Russia and Georgia, and publication of her images in the magazines Russian Reporter and Ogoniok confirmed her reputation as a committed photojournalist. In conflict zones and on the fringes of society she combines a sharp eye with a deep humanity, in the tradition of Americans like Eugene Smith, Nan Goldin and Jessica Dimmock.
“I met Lilya in the street in the summer of 2008. I took some portraits, then she invited me to her house. She was living with her boyfriend Pasha, who was also a drug addict, and their two-year-old daughter Anfisa, in a dropout commune in the centre of St Petersburg. It was just one big party, but Lilya and Pasha weren’t doing such a bad job with Anfisa. Sometimes things got out of hand, though, like the time Anfisa climbed up onto the window ledge and her mother caught her just in time. The little girl was well behaved; she didn’t cry much, didn’t ask for much. She’d adapted to
her environment. She was a little backward in her speech, but that didn’t worry her parents.” This reportage caused real controversy when it was shown in St Petersburg in 2008. Most visitors thought Anfisa should be taken away from her parents and placed in an orphanage. The police were called in and Irina Popova was ordered to give the family’s address – which she refused to do, claiming her right to protect her sources. The investigation was dropped. “The photographer is not there to pass judgment. Her duty is to tell a story. If someone were to ask me my opinion on this little girl’s future, I would answer with no hesitation that however dysfunctional her family might be, Russia’s orphanages are much worse.”
Anna Shpakova, curator
Text from the catalogue-book “Photoquai”, co-edited by Musée du Quai Branly- Actes-Sud
