Compelling Portraits of People Who Live Alone in the Forest

While most people all over the world live in a community with others around them, Russian photographer Danila Tkachenko captures those that choose to turn their backs on this lifestyle. His compelling series Escape documents people who instead live a solitary existence in the wilderness. They make their homes in the Russian and Ukrainian forest and fashion makeshift dwellings from the land.

We see Tkachenko's subjects appear in different ways throughout the series; some convey a sense of peacefulness as they lay on the trees, while others look gaunt and less at ease. The photographer is sure to show their homes, too, and it's remarkable to see the different structures that people build and the objects they collect. Surrounded by the lush, green forest, it's where these individuals have taken refuge from their former lives.

All of these photographs and more are compiled into a book titled Escape, which is available from Peperoni Books.

Danila Tkachenko website
via [TAXI]

Sara Barnes

Sara Barnes is a Staff Editor at My Modern Met, Manager of My Modern Met Store, and co-host of the My Modern Met Top Artist Podcast. As an illustrator and writer living in Seattle, she chronicles illustration, embroidery, and beyond through her blog Brown Paper Bag and Instagram @brwnpaperbag. She wrote a book about embroidery artist Sarah K. Benning titled 'Embroidered Life' that was published by Chronicle Books in 2019. Sara is a graduate of the Maryland Institute College of Art. She earned her BFA in Illustration in 2008 and MFA in Illustration Practice in 2013.
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