Considering embodiment, the concept of metabolization is often overlooked. Yet, the very essence of incarnation demands the capacity to absorb, transform, and effectively digest what we encounter, experience, anticipate, and overthink.

This process of metabolization yields a series of profound benefits for both the body and the self: letting go, allowing things to be, and embracing the present moment. It involves processing negativity just like any other experience, without becoming overly emotionally entangled in it. The ability to transform negativity into positive outcomes—or simply to integrate it into a reality that one must face and process—is crucial to the overall health and sanity of a living being.

Vitalii’s approach to confronting the raw and often harsh aspects of reality, channeling them through dance—a medium that anchors our physical being in tangible reality—mirrors this innate ability within us all: to return to what is real and physical instead of getting lost in imagined scenarios or virtual worlds. There is always a tomorrow.

C: I’m familiar with your work, but mostly through Instagram… I’m glad we’re having this opportunity to talk today because I really felt a connection with it and would love to learn more about it – especially regarding the importance of movement and authenticity. I’m still a bit new to it, so… could you tell me more about it?

‍V: Give me a second…

C: Sure! I’m interested in knowing how it all started.

V: The main motivation in my work has always been interaction with people, the desire to understand them better, and exchange experiences. I’ve never been self-contained, and I find it difficult to create anything without interacting with another person. I’m not the kind of artist who creates his own world in the studio. For my work, communication with other people is crucial. All my creativity is about communication and learning new things, gaining new life experiences.

When I took my first steps in creativity, I didn’t have my own style or any special vision, but I wanted to find it, and I was drawn to people who interested me – artists, musicians, people from the art world, and I learned from them.

To do this, I created my own magazine where I wrote about these people, made short videos about them, and even had a printed edition. So, at the beginning of this journey, I made a magazine about people, but at its core, it was a need for communication and finding myself through that.

My approach to creativity was likely heavily influenced by my friend and mentor, photographer Dmitry Pryahin. I made a major feature on him in the magazine, and later filmed several documentaries about him. Initially, the films were just an excuse for communication, but during the filming process, we became friends, and I can even call him my father, in a way.

C: Is he like a Spiritual Father to you?

‍V: Yes, a father in art! Dmitry has a very interesting technique for working with people. When he photographs people, he asks them to start moving freely: to express something inexpressible with their whole body, face, and fingers. If you’re feeling bad, show it with your whole body; if you’re happy, express it with your whole body, without thoughts and attempts to control it, without the desire to look beautiful – just move as if you were grass swaying freely in the wind. This realization of freedom in self-expression through movement has had a significant impact on me. The desire to express something genuine in an impassioned process, without trying to control it or appear as someone you’re not.

The pursuit of intense, sincere experience is what interests me and what I try to engage in, whether it’s documentary film, dance, or photography.If you look at Dmitry’s work, you’ll see that it’s close to the works of old Japanese photographers, such as Nobuyoshi Araki or Daidō Moriyama – it’s about impressive emotions and intensity.

And perhaps he taught me to strive for something extremely sincere and genuine in art. Like Japanese photographers who don’t look at the camera when they shoot, thus sometimes capturing the true moment, unrestrained by our perception of it. For example, if they are making love, they photograph it from the perspective of a participant, conveying everything as it is, without attempting to embellish it. And for me, in working on projects, it’s important to be a participant in the events, to strive for authenticity and honesty in experience.

That’s why documentary film and documentary photography are closer to me.

For instance, if I’m making a film about marginalized youth in Moscow, I sleep on the streets with them, go to concerts in abandoned buildings, swim in the river with them, while continuing to shoot. I aim to immerse myself fully in the situations and experience them with my subjects, and it shows in the footage, and the viewer feels it.

‍C: A bit like… ah, I forgot the name in Russian, you know, “Camera-Eye” by Dziga Vertov, ah, “kinoglaz,” but a bit different! It’s not about documentary filmmaking where the camera is just placed somewhere and captures what happens in the frame, but more about seizing life through a specific point of view, a more unique and genuine one – in this case, yours. To me, your work feels very immersed in authenticity and a desire for authenticity. Do you strive for this, or is it just intuitive?

V: I think I have two lines in my artistic path, and it might be important to mention both. One is related to my documentaries or images that are deeply immersed in life. I take my camera and shoot a documentary about my father and the people around him in a small Russian provincial town. It’s about poor people, very intense, dark, and deeply connected to Russian culture – it’s reminiscent of Dostoevsky, with a strong, very vivid energy.

This type of work is solely about people, pain, love, sensory and deeper stages of life. It’s less about creating beautiful images, and it can be uncomfortable for my soul, but it’s important for me to produce such work. Sometimes I feel like this is the only path that makes sense to me, and it can be challenging for people, but this is truly what unites us.

The second type of work is more about my socialization in the global society – it’s more about survival in society, about status, about what provides certain guarantees.

For example, when you try to integrate into a specific sphere and create the best conditions for yourself to work there, like if you want to work in fashion, be among interesting and/or famous people. It’s about people’s expectations of you, about what the public wants to see.

Sometimes I work with fashion brands and famous people, and sometimes it’s very deep and amazing connections, but it can also be about social status and social currency, the impression you make on people. For example, I strive to do a shoot for a well-known brand or performer because it’s trending, it makes me part of what’s currently in vogue, and it brings me success in the eyes of people.

And sometimes I depend on this and engage in it, even though at its core, it’s far from what I truly want to express. Brands, fashion, popular people – it’s all a kind of illusion, a cult of success, unrelated to real life. Rather, it’s not that.

There is simply less sincerity, honesty, and something human in it compared to what you can find in ordinary daily life. I’d like to focus more on the first path, but I often get drawn into the second.

‍C: Still, I feel that remaining authentic and embodying your work and vision is something that is always present in your work. For example, when I watched ‘Gimme a Second 2,’ you worked with Rich the Kid and Ye, and still, it felt like you didn’t compromise your vision.

V: Maybe, but I’m not sure.

C: Also! I wanted to revisit what you said about community and communication – which I consider the foundation of life. You showcase a wide range of emotions such as pain, violence, anger, love… in Figurative Destruction for instance, you integrate both a solitary dancer and a duo. I was very attentive to how you can showcase both a solitary experience of self-destruction and one within the context of a relationship – this ambivalence is very palpable; how do you relate to that?

V: If we’re talking about the notions of aggression and destruction in my art, I think we should talk about my dance.

My dance is only about randomly expressing some complex feelings sometimes in an aggressive way.

When I shoot such a video, it usually happens in depressive and static conditions…

C: Is it like a cathartic experience?

V: Umm… maybe it’s more related to returning to my body. When I’m only in my head and overthinking, it’s sort of a proxy, and sometimes this practice helps me to communicate about it in a physical way, with my body. It helps me to break out of my head. I think it’s important to mention that I believe everyone can have this practice when feeling something similar; it’s one of the best ways of communication, to talk about something. It happens that when I’m working with people, because I learned this type of work from Dmitry, I try to tell them that they can use their body to demonstrate their real feelings. They can express it through this.

C: I don’t know if you know about somatic shaking or dancing; I do it every morning, and it has changed so many things, haha.

‍V: Yes! Haha, I know about it.

‍C: For example, when an animal, like a deer, comes out of a state of stress, they shut down the survival mode by shaking their body. It’s fascinating!

V: Yes! The question is why we couldn’t use this very natural and organic thing for our body to make art?

Why is art only about some beautiful poses and placements, where only certain positions and movements are deemed beautiful, like in fashion, you know…

C: Like choreography?

V: Choreography is more interesting to me than fashion, but of course, sometimes I forget that fashion is about products and beauty and not about art. But when I look at fashion photographers’ work from 20 years ago, it was different, more artistic; now it’s more about image and sales.

‍C: Yes! I totally agree and realize I didn’t properly introduce myself to you, haha. I major in Philosophy with a focus on Fashion Theory and Fashion Design. For me, there’s a difference between “Fashion” and fashion design. Fashion design is the art, science, and practice of creating clothing that coexists with our bodies, informs it, allows for movement, enhances it, and so on. I feel that nowadays, compared to fashion photography of the 90s and 2000s, which had a deep awareness of movement, choreography, and placement, we’ve moved towards a dominance of visual impact and archetypes.

‍V: Yes!

C: Exactly! It’s fascinating how art and fashion intersect with these concepts. Your approach to capturing raw, unfiltered emotion and movement is a refreshing perspective and speaks to a deeper level of engagement with both the body and the medium.

V: Thank you! I appreciate that. It’s important to me to maintain that level of authenticity and connection in whatever I create, whether it’s through dance, film, or photography. The goal is always to convey something genuine and to engage deeply with the subject matter.

All images courtesy of Vitalii Akimov