Mar 16

Mar 16 Photo Journal Monday: Danila Tkachenko

Boiler house of a closed aerodrome. Kazakhstan, Karaganda region, 2015. © Danila Tkachenko

Restricted Areas

The project "Restricted Areas" is about the human impulse towards utopia, about our striving for perfection through technological progress.

Ruins of experimental laser system “ZET”. Kazakhstan, Karaganda region, 2015. © Danila Tkachenko

Humans are always trying to own ever more than they have—this is the source of technical progress. The byproducts of this progress are various commodities as well as the tools of violence in order to hold power over others.

Better, higher, stronger—these ideals often express the main ideology of governments. To achieve these standards, governments are ready to sacrifice almost everything. Meanwhile, the individual is supposed to become a tool for reaching these goals. In exchange, the individual is promised a higher level of comfort.

Pumpjacks on a spent oil field. Russia, Republic of Bashkortostan, 2014. © Danila Tkachenko

Former residential buildings in a deserted polar scientific town specialized in biological research. Russia, Republic of Komi, 2014. © Danila Tkachenko

For "Restricted Areas," I traveled in search of places that used to hold great importance for the idea of technological progress. These places are now deserted. They have lost their significance, along with their utopian ideology which is now obsolete.

Airplane – amphibia with vertical take-off VVA-14. Russia, Moscow area, 2013. © Danila Tkachenko

A monument to creators of Russia’s nuclear shield in Dzerzhinskiy city, where solid rocket fuel, missile charges, hulls, and engines were produced. Russia, Dzerzhinsky city, 2013. © Danila Tkachenko

Many of these places were once secret cities, that did not appear on any maps or public records. These places were the sites of forgotten scientific triumphs, abandoned buildings of almost inhuman complexity. The perfect technocratic future that never came.

Deserted observatory. Kazakhstan, Almaty region, 2015. © Danila Tkachenko

Any progress comes to its end earlier or later and it can happen for different reasons—nuclear war, economic crisis, natural disaster. What's interesting for me is to witness what remains after the progress has ground to a halt.