Last Project 2002

“Last Project” by Arsen Savadov is a photograph of a small group of young people gathered together by what looks like a lookout post, with one firework shooting sparks in the distance. I feel like I’m looking at something quite personal here. I imagine Savadov there with them, capturing a moment with his friends. They appear pensive and relaxed, but at the same time, they’re also posing for the camera. They are together in some kind of mutual agreement with the artist in the making. It makes me wonder what they’re looking at, off into the distance. It might have been their last summer together before they all went their separate ways. What's also interesting is the firework exploding in the left foreground. Perhaps it’s a visual metaphor for the fleeting nature of the present, like a last hurrah. Savadov offers us a fragment of time through his lens and his personal relationship to the subjects involved. It feels intimate, fragile, yet celebratory all the same.