© 2026
20 TONS OF SOVIET JOY
The project is a remembrance of what the builders of Dushanbe had to leave behind departing the city forever. During the Civil War in Tajikistan, the exodus reached nearly one million people, who moved south and west, never to return. The builders of Dushanbe had to give up their apartments, their furniture, the books and table sets, the whole life and the whole city.
The belongings that could be saved were shipped in identical railway containers, each designed to hold no more than twenty tons. In this way, a specific unit of weight became a universal measure for the Soviet wealth and joy.
The container became a kind of virtual memory framework, a space where everything is mixed together, as if in a melting pot: carefully packed cabinets and books, memories, albums, photographs, personal family history and a series of political events – all stitched together, fused into a single stream, into a great exodus.
Although this exodus began more than thirty years ago, it continues today. Along with the interiors of private homes, the vast material legacy of the Soviet past – its architecture – is gradually disappearing, drifting and dissolving in time. For decades, it remained an integral part of local identity, shaped by the ambitions of Soviet urban planning. Today, these buildings are steadily being replaced by new developments.
With a delay, the architecture now follows the same path as those twenty-ton containers – leaving the city behind. What remains in its place is nostalgia: sites of memory that once defined the city’s landscape are replaced by a virtual frame, a ghost of a fleeting past.
Cosmoscow 2025
The belongings that could be saved were shipped in identical railway containers, each designed to hold no more than twenty tons. In this way, a specific unit of weight became a universal measure for the Soviet wealth and joy.
The container became a kind of virtual memory framework, a space where everything is mixed together, as if in a melting pot: carefully packed cabinets and books, memories, albums, photographs, personal family history and a series of political events – all stitched together, fused into a single stream, into a great exodus.
Although this exodus began more than thirty years ago, it continues today. Along with the interiors of private homes, the vast material legacy of the Soviet past – its architecture – is gradually disappearing, drifting and dissolving in time. For decades, it remained an integral part of local identity, shaped by the ambitions of Soviet urban planning. Today, these buildings are steadily being replaced by new developments.
With a delay, the architecture now follows the same path as those twenty-ton containers – leaving the city behind. What remains in its place is nostalgia: sites of memory that once defined the city’s landscape are replaced by a virtual frame, a ghost of a fleeting past.
Cosmoscow 2025
a nomad exhibiton
20 TONS OF SOVIET JOY
