Waiting—long, tiresome months and years of waiting—for the news, for the vaccines, for any break in the narrative, for good developments, for positive change, for our lives and everyone else’s, and simply looking outward.
In early March 2020, at the onset of the COVID-19 quarantine, I was in active denial of the pandemic.
While following all recommended safety protocols, I was reluctant even to acknowledge its existence, let alone consider how it might affect my art. I did not want to give it the power to enter my world. Eventually, however, external reality began to infiltrate my life, occupying physical space in my daily routine. Disposable gloves, surgical masks, bottles of sanitizer and rubbing alcohol, disinfecting wipes, sterilization devices—countless forms and variations of protective gear filled the available surfaces and spaces of my home.
And I decided that I would not allow it to win.
I protested. I looked outside. I noticed. I recorded. I dreamed. I composed and combined.
This was my fight against a sick world, and this is my response.
About Yelena Zhavoronkova
Yelena Zhavoronkova is a San Francisco–based fine art photographer and graphic designer. She received a Master’s degree in Industrial Design from the St. Petersburg Academy of Art and Industry in Russia and worked as a graphic designer for over forty years. Over the past fifteen years, she has been deeply engaged in the study and practice of photography, using the medium to articulate her artistic vision. Her projects are both deeply personal and broadly universal, addressing viewers on an intimate level that resonates widely.
Born and having spent the first half of her life in the city of St. Petersburg, Russia, Zhavoronkova was profoundly influenced by its atmosphere and visual character. The city’s distinctive palette of cool grays, punctuated by occasional bursts of color, along with its cold winter night skies and unsetting summer sun, formed a lasting backdrop to her visual sensibility. Monochromatic and black-and-white photography, in particular, reflect the city’s mood with precision. Frequent visits to museums, especially the State Hermitage Museum, played a significant role in her artistic education. She became intimately familiar with the museum’s labyrinthine halls, easily navigating to her favorite works by Rodin and Matisse on the third floor, the Rembrandt Room, and the Dutch Golden Age masterpieces on the second level. Her engagement with visual art continues beyond photography, and she remains especially drawn to the works of the Old Masters, including Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Sandro Botticelli, Albrecht Dürer, Lucas Cranach, and Hans Holbein the Younger.
Since 2010, her photography projects have been exhibited at the de Young Museum of Art in San Francisco, San Francisco City Hall, and the Center for Photographic Art in Carmel, California; Blue Sky Gallery and LightBox Gallery in Oregon; Anzenberger Gallery in Vienna, Austria; and numerous other galleries across the United States and Europe, including The Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Finland, and Russia. Her work has been published in the online edition of The New Yorker, Black and White Magazine, All About Photo Magazine, Square Magazine, and Analog Forever Magazine, and has been featured in Shutterbug Magazine and Transformation literary journal, among others. As part of the Indie Photobook Library Collection, her book Memories in Red is included in the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Yale University.
Her archival digital, silver gelatin, platinum/palladium prints, and copperplate photogravures are held in numerous private collections and institutional archives throughout the United States and Europe. She is currently represented by Anzenberger Gallery in Vienna, Austria, and Corden|Potts Gallery in San Francisco, California. [Official Website]
