Mountain Hoverla is the highest point of Ukraine, by analogy to the sacred Mount Fuji in Japan and Japanese, is almost sacred and mythical aura to Ukrainians. Besides these two mountains outwardly similar and have almost perfect conical shape.
With these photographs I want to fill the gap that remained unfilled in visual art in Ukraine and with coloring I want appeal to series “Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji” by Katsushika Hokusai and his metaphysical and authentic relationship to Fuji.
Also I want to bring shape of mountain Hoverla to ukrainian’s perception as a sacred place, which currently is a tourist attraction. It is very easy to get to the top of Hoverla from several routes and on the way to it a person should immerse himself in the local traditions of highlanders of the Transcarpathian region.

I have been filming in that area for several years. I am filming how people live, what they do, how they work, in addition, I film directly the mountains and nature. With all this photos I want to engrave in history this time, such a slice of the environment in which they live there, the circumstances, the inherent things and ordinary life. But on the other hand, I want these photos to become such a work “out of time”, which would remain relevant over the years by such a old technic of hand coloring black&white photographs.

I dreamed and imagined a lot even before I started shooting: what should be filmed, what plots, some traditional elements, but the first time I got to those places I was forced to change my mind and rethink everything. I had to film reality, document what was available because otherwise it wouldn’t be honest, it wouldn’t be honest represent my stereotypes and fictions as reality. From other hand it would not be fair not to film, for example, a shepherd in rubber boots and a raincoat, but to put a model in a traditional Ukrainian outfit and visually assert that this is how all shepherds looks like.
Therefore, this photo series is largely documentary, a slice of time. I would like to cover all of Ukraine with this photo series, but unfortunately, Mount Hoverla (which is a connecting visual and semantic symbol) can be seen only in the Carpathians, and therefore it cannot serve as a identifying symbol for all of Ukraine as Fuji for Japan.