Years Like Water is a decade-long look at a small Russian village, its inhabitants, ramshackle institutions, nature, and mythology. The series loosely follows the lives of four interconnected families – the children growing up unsupervised in a magical wilderness, whilst the adults struggle for survival. Over more than ten years of visits, Sablin attended birthdays and funerals, drank tea with the grandmothers, and listened to stories of the villagers’ loneliness and love for one another. Her photographs from Alekhovshchina explore and describe a world that doesn’t fit into the neat narrative of “Putin’s Russia” presented by both Eastern and Western media. It is more complicated – interweaving beauty, poverty, trauma, and hope.
