Oded Wagenstein
Paddington Reservoir Gardens
Exhibition Dates:
Exhibition Description
This series documents a group of elderly women living within an isolated peninsula in Northern Siberia. They were once part of a migrating society of reindeer herders, but today, in their old age, spend most of their days in solitude, isolated from nature and their wandering community. While men are encouraged to maintain their roles as herders as they grow older, women often face the struggles of old age alone. I immersed myself among the people living in this the small Siberian village. Over many cups of tea, they shared their stories, lullabies, and longings with me. Listening to their stories felt like walking on a thin line between present and memory, reality and a dream. Using those stories as my map and compass, I went to document the same spaces they thrived in long ago. I created photographs inspired by their memories of the past and juxtaposed them with portraits that reflected their current reality. By doing so, I tried to give their stories a visual representation— One that could last after they are already gone.
Artist talks
When: 12.30pm Saturday 4 May
Where: Festival Hub, Paddington Town Hall, 249 Oxford St, Paddington NSW 2021
Topic: How to receive a portrait instead of taking it and four other lessons the people I photographed taught me
AND
as part of Head On Conversations, session 1 Why is nobody paying attention? Recapturing the audience
When: 1.30-2.45pm Saturday 4 May
Where: Imperial Hotel, 252 Oxford St, Paddington, NSW, 2021
Artist Bio
Oded Wagenstein was born in 1986 in the Middle East to a family of migrants from the Balkans. He uses the photographic medium to explore the themes of ageing, longing, and memory. Oded received a degree in Sociology, Anthropology and Film, from Tel Aviv University. Last year, his photographs were exhibited in the United States, Russia, Germany, South Africa, China, Bangladesh, and more. His work has been featured by National Geographic, BBC, The Guardian, and VOGUE, among others. In 2018 he was a winner of the PDN Annual Photo Awards, LensCulture’s Emerging Talent Awards, and selected for Photolucida’s Critical Mass Top 50. Oded is currently a senior lecturer at the Galitz School of Photography in Tel Aviv.
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