Sochi Project Box Set: An Atlas of War and Tourism in the Caucasus

This Special Edition of 'An Atlas of War and Tourism in the Caucasus' consists of a signed copy of the book and a protective folder with two signed and numbered C-prints in a handmade red linen slipcase. Elena, Sochi, Russia, 2012 Elena, thirty-one, has been a dancer at Art Klub, the strip club on the first floor of the monstrous Hotel Zhemchuzhina, for eighteen months. Loud music, sweaty bodies on the pebble beach, and striptease are perhaps more at home in Sochi than the sporting spectacles of the Winter Olympics. The coming years will prove what survives of both. Hamzad Ivloev, Nazran, Ingushetia, 2012 Hamzad Ivloev, 44, was a policeman in Karabulak. One night he discovered a booby trap. At that moment reinforcements arrived. Hamzad started screaming and telling them to run away. But no one responded. He decided to throw himself on the grenade. "In retrospect, it was all for nothing. I sacrificed myself for a bunch of cowards", he says bitterly. Rob Hornstra and Arnold van Bruggen have been working together since 2009 to tell the story of Sochi, Russia, site of the 2014 Winter Olympic Games. They have returned repeatedly to this region as committed practitioners of “slow journalism,” establishing a solid foundation of research on and engagement with this small yet incredibly complicated place before it finds itself in the glare of international media attention. As Van Bruggen writes, “Never before have the Olympic Games been held in a region that contrasts more strongly with the glamour of the event than Sochi. Just twenty kilometres away is the conflict zone Abkhazia. To the east the Caucasus Mountains stretch into obscure and impoverished republics such as North Ossetia and Chechnya.” Hornstra’s photographic approach combines the best of documentary storytelling with contemporary portraiture, found photographs, and other visual elements collected over the course of their travels. The highlights and key elements of this extensive effort are brought together for the first time in this volume, designed by Kummer & Herrman, offering alternative perspectives and in-depth reporting on this remarkable region, the site of the most expensive Olympic Games, which sits at the combustible crossroads of war, tourism, and history. Rob Hornstra (born in Born, The Netherlands, 1975) is a photographer and self-publisher of slow-form documentary work. In addition to his work on The Sochi Project, he is also the founder and former artistic director of FOTODOK—Space for Documentary Photography. Hornstra is represented by Flatland Gallery, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.