PHOTOGRAPHY: Project 'I had left my home early in the morning'. Georgia - Armenia, 2015 - 2019. By Lilit Matevosyan

This project is documentary research of the past, realized through the prism of personal history. Based on memories from my childhood, I create an autobiographical visual journey to places that used to be my home.
The Immigration topic allowed me to go beyond my personal story — it is not only about the history of a particular family, but about entire generations of people living in the Caucasus after the collapse of the Soviet Union who was forced to flee their to seek a better life.

My goal is to try to reconnect, to find lost roots, to learn more about the present in the past. (Lilit Matevosyan)

Slideshow was produced in the frame of Multimedia Lab Production Grant Program for South Caucasus Female Photographers May-October 2019 mentored by Justyna Mielnikiewicz / MAPS. Multimedia Lab aims to support the professional strengthening of emerging women photographers of South Caucasus region that cover social issues in Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan and use the medium of photography as the powerful tool of storytelling. The project is financed by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.

Copyright: Lilith Matevosyan

Music: Karina Kazaryan
soundcloud.com/karinakazaryan

More: Post-Soviet South Caucasus migration explored in Tbilisi display of photographer Lilith Matevosyan [agenda_ge]
Photographic works reflecting the plight of generations forced into migration throughout the South Caucasus following the dissolution of the Soviet Union will go on display at Tbilisi's Untitled Gallery later this week, celebrating the work of photographer Lilith Matevosyan.

Presenting an "autobiographical visual journey" throughout locations she called her home throughout the years, Matevosyan will exhibit photos that use personal history as a prism on the generational transformation created by the collapse of the USSR in the 1990s.

"[I]t is not only about the history of a particular family, but about entire generations of people living in the Caucasus after the collapse of the Soviet Union who was forced to flee their to seek a better life" - Lilith Matevosyan

The Sochi-based photographer said her goal with the work was to "reconnect, find the lost roots and learn about the present while searching for the clues in the past".

The selection of works is titled I had left my home early in the morning, with the photographs produced as part of the Tbilisi Photography & Multimedia Museum's 2019 project for supporting women photographers of the region. Led by Justyna Mielnikiewicz, a Tbilisi-based, award-winning Polish photographer, the grant for women was held as part of the multi-year Photography Hub for Education and Innovation, a project of the TPMM supported by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation via the Embassy of Switzerland in Georgia.

In the TPMM grant Mielnikiewicz mentored Matevosyan [instagram], who told her social media followers in November she was "really happy" to have her long-term project published by the museum. Works produced as a result of the grant - by Matevosyan and six other women photographers from Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia - were also exhibited at the museum earlier this month to shed the light on social issues in their respective countries.