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Capturing Traditional Life in Russia

Two elderly sisters embody a sometimes forgotten but not abandoned traditional style of living in Russia.

October 26, 2014

Credit: Nadia Sablin - The Other Hundred

Nadia Sablin lives and works out of Brooklyn, New York City, but she grew up in Soviet Russia and the American Midwest. Her photographs have been featured in museums and galleries. She captures images from primarily Russia and the United States.

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Sisters Aleftina and Ludmila Sablina spend half of each year in a small Russian village that has changed little over the decades. Both in their 70s, they carry on with their traditional way of life, chopping wood for heating, bringing water from the well and making their own clothes.

The sisters lived together when they were children, then worked in technical jobs: Aleftina in engineering, Ludmila in chemistry.

Neither married nor had children. Now they live off their pensions and some help from their other siblings. When not in Alekhovshchina, they each stay in their own apartment in separate towns, visiting each other occasionally.

Text and photographs by Nadia Sablin


russia-8  Enlarge   The sisters gather the last batch of strawberries in their garden.

russia-1-resize Enlarge   Ludmila poses on a birch tree stump with a rusty sickle.

russia-6-resize Enlarge   The sisters use a two-handed saw to cut wood. While most neighbors have upgraded to chainsaws, they continue to use tools that have been in the family for decades.

russia-5-resize Enlarge   Aleftina and Ludmila bring planks scavenged from a sawmill reject pile. The planks will either be used to build a new fence or burned in their stove.


Nadia Sablin lives and works out of Brooklyn, New York City, but she grew up in Soviet Russia and the American Midwest. Her photographs have been featured in museums and galleries. She captures images from primarily Russia and the United States.

The Other Hundred is a unique photo-book project (order here) aimed as a counterpoint to the Forbes 100 and other media rich lists by telling the stories of people around the world who are not rich but who deserve to be celebrated.

Its 100 photo-stories move beyond the stereotypes and cliches that fill so much of the world’s media to explore the lives of people whose aspirations and achievements are at least as noteworthy as any member of the world’s richest 1,000.

Selected from 11,000 images shot in 158 countries and submitted by nearly 1,500 photographers, The Other Hundred celebrates those who will never find themselves on the world’s rich lists or celebrity websites.

Takeaways

Five photos capture a glimpse into traditional, rural life in #Russia.

In #Russia two elderly women show what a traditional life, away from the cities of #Russia, looks like.