Sense of place: Max Sher captures the spirit of the Archstoyanie land art festival

Archstoyanie is an annual festival that brings thousands of people from around Russia to admire enormous art installations scattered around the idyllic landscape of Nikola-Lenivets, a tiny village four hours south of Moscow. The Calvert Journal sent photographer Max Sher to capture the spirit of the place and the people there. St Petersburg-born Sher, who has worked for publications such as Monocle, Wallpaper and the Financial Times, looked beyond the obvious with his images: “I wanted to demystify this place, which means no ‘biutiful’ images and no dramatic angles, just recording deadpan beauty from the height of the human eye.” Sher also sought to document the people, often locals, who make all the art possible, “to add some context, to photograph art with people around it, security guards and other people from ‘behind the scenes’”.