Perm

Perm is the most easterly city in Europe, situated nine hundred miles east of Moscow, between the Kama River and the Ural Mountains. With an Opera and Ballet Theatre dating from 1870, an important art collection and the State University founded at the beginning of the 20^th century, Perm is a cultural and educational centre for the region. It has been linked to Oxford since 1990 and was twinned in 1995.

The photographs exhibited here represent two very different aspects of the region. There is the traditional life of the rural villages and then there is the city with its vibrant modernity. The contrasts between the two could not be greater.

Valery Amotnik was born in Murmansk in 1939. In the late1970s, he was given a camera and, shortly after, he took a portrait that surprised and delighted him: ‘If an ordinary photograph suddenly begins to emotionally affect you and others, if it causes a shiver inside, this is Art’. He never looked back and has taken part in 35 international exhibitions: in Spain, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Russia, Georgia, UK and France.

Andrey Krotov, 58 years old, is a retired military man. He has been taking photographs for over 40 years. Andrey is a member of the Union of Photo Artists of Russia and a photographer with FIAP (Fédération Internationale de l' Art Photographique) and is Chairman of the Perm Regional Branch of the Union of Wildlife Photographers.

Gherman Ánton (Stolbov), born in 1962, is a member of the Union of Photo Artists of Russia and the People's Photo Club in Perm. His main areas of interest are landscape, reportage and mobile phone photography. Gherman says, ‘My goal is to see this beauty and to convey it to my audience. In my work I explore the unusual sides of simple things and to express my vision of the world around us.’

Darya Permyakova, 29 years old, was born and raised in the city of Perm. She is a journalist and has been engaged in photography for three years. She seeks to capture the moment in ways that will arouse a strong emotional response in the viewer. She sees this exhibition as an opportunity to show her hometown, her country, to demonstrate the humanity it shares with the rest of the world – not ideal, but beautiful in its own way.