On April 29, the main exhibition of Odesa Photo Days Festival 2021 “Who’s Next to You?” opens at the Museum of Odesa Modern Art.

The theme of the exhibition was formulated last year, before the pandemic. Back then, we announced an international open call and were interested in how photographers from different countries understand the concepts of co-presence and intimacy, we wanted to think together about how often we pay attention to the people next to us: our neighbors, children, colleagues, sexual partners, and what we really know about them.

After a year in the pandemic, the questions that were confusing then have become even more acute. The need for social distance has significantly limited the opportunity to meet the Other and forced us to rethink it. Today, the question “Who is next to you?” has become even more disturbing: we have become even more afraid of physical proximity than before the pandemic, which has deepened the already existing gap between people.
The series of participants in the main exhibition visualize stories from different continents about people who are close and far away at the same time. These are stories from forgotten archives and the lives of immigrants, neighborhood children, watermelon sellers on the highway, etc.; stories embodied in things and found objects, in direct portraits, collages, and old family photographs.

More information about the main exhibition is available on the website: http://thephotodays.org/holovna-vystavka-2021/.

*The poster uses images from Gloria Oyarzabal’s series Woman Go No’gree.