My neck of the woods

When I think of Russian landscape, at least that of the European part of Russia, the history of which is heavily influenced by the invasions of  Mongols and Tartars, I imagine it as a vast steppe. In reality, until relatively recent times (mid-XVIII century), the European Russia was dominated by forests.

I realize the great importance of forests in Russian history and culture only now, when reading the lectures by Vasily Klyuchevsky. He explains that the forest was not only the natural resource and a strategic barrier between the early Russian city-states and the Asian invaders, but also the spiritual haven, a place where, for example, hermits would retreat to live in silence in order to escape the stresses of then-modern society. I suppose, nowadays, living without Internet would be a comparable feat…

When I go to Russia this year, I would like to try to take some photos of (whatever remains of) its forests. Generally, I find that photographing forests is not easy – the light is limited, the focus of the composition if not easy to define, unlike in the pictures of sea coasts or mountains. Nevertheless, some of my favourite landscapes from BC are those of the forests (e.g. the image above.) The West Coast’s forests and the trees themselves, though beautiful, are quite different from those of Russia. I wonder if I would be able to convey this difference in a photograph…