Open Call Group Exhibition
VAIF25, Labattoir, Thessaloniki, Greece
2025

The land of the cat’s elbow

Kazym is a national village in Siberia. Most of its inhabitants are Kazym Khanty, an Indigenous people of Northern Russia. This community has its own gods, customs, culture, and crafts.

The Kazym Khanty have long been accustomed to living in unity with nature, despite the harsh climatic conditions of the Arctic zone. Local people believe that the goddess Kasum-imi once dropped her mitten here, and since then humans have lived in these lands. She is the daughter of Torum, the supreme god, and can take the form of a cat. For this reason, the place is called “The Land of the Cat’s Elbow.”

Many families in Kazym practice reindeer herding. In spring, when searching for food, the herds become mobile and move through the taiga from pasture to pasture. The herders are always nearby, guiding the animals and protecting them from wolves. Nomadic families rarely stay in one place for long, spending their lives in constant movement across Siberia.

Reindeer herders often live in a chum (a traditional tent used by reindeer herders) or in small wooden huts, but sometimes they have to sleep in a narta (a wooden sled commonly used in the Arctic) under the open sky. Despite the rapid development of modern technologies, many aspects of life here remain unchanged: reindeer herders often live today much as their ancestors did a hundred years ago.