House of Baba Yaga

“Night came but the darkness didn’t last long. The eyes of all the skulls on the fence around the house of Baba Yaga began to gleam and the forest became as bright as day. ”— From “Vassilissa The Beautiful” Russian fairy tale

“The House of Baba Yaga” depicts the reality and daily life of the photographer’s family house in Grodekovo, a typical village of some three hundred people, north of Vladivostok in the Far Eastern Russia. Exploring the notion of home, the artist offers to viewers two visions: daylight portraits of family members currently occupying the house and night photos of the house exterior. For the night photos, Yury Toroptsov uses the visual codes of Russian traditional fairy tale illustrations. Dark shadows, saturated colours create a feeling of another reality.