«Dirt and Order,» Anna Segina, Yekaterinburg
Urban space is a constant source of anxiety for the contemporary resident. Among the numerous factors causing unease, dirt holds a special place: a viscous substance that disrupts order and unnerves with its uncertainty. The art project «Dirt and Order» is based on the artist’s personal experience encountering dirt in the street environment and the attempt to transform reluctant communication into intentional artistic interaction.
Following anthropologist Mary Douglas, the author posits that dirt does not exist in itself—it is a byproduct of a system of ordering. Boots are not dirty until they end up on the dinner table. Dirt arises where there is a system and an exception to it. This project investigates how this filtering mechanism operates: who decides, and on what basis, what is considered «unclean, ” and how perception shifts when we alter the context and visual qualities of a material. The experiment demonstrates that any attempts to manage dirt or address its exceptionality only create a new „sieve”—and the process continues at the next level.
The installation consists of several parts. On the wall are three panels made of glass vials filled with city grime, sorted by color: gray, pink, and yellow gradients. Placed within laboratory glass—a symbol of purity and safety—the dirt itself becomes a «specimen, ” subject to rhythm and order.
Mural «Samples» 82×42×4 cm, 3 pcs Dirt, test tubes, wood
At the center of the exhibit is a video projection of continuous dirt sifting through a sieve—a metaphor for the infinite act of labeling and discarding the undesirable.
«Sieve» Video 2:39 Filming, Editing — Gleb Stolyarov
The viewer can sit on soft poufs upholstered in fabric printed with a texture of mud; the repulsive texture, when translated into an image, loses its unappealing quality.
Soft Poufs 70×70×130 cm Fabric printing, foam filling.
These additions complement a series of objects crafted in the Japanese technique of dorodango—lustrous orbs made of earth and water, evoking the childlike ability to play with mud free from adult anthropocentric rigidity.
«Dorodango» Objects D — 5–12 cm Mud, Lacquer
The exhibition concludes with a glowing table reminiscent of a negatoscope—a device doctors use to examine X-rays. Spread across it are images of urban grime viewed under a microscope, printed on transparent slides.
Images from «Dirt Under a Microscope» A4 Film, Print
The project began with a question about the essence of mud and arrived at the answer: the essence is elusive; mud is a contextual and fluid concept. Answers are born not from metaphysical definitions, but from shared experience—the attempt to change and to change oneself, to develop the ability to see «inhuman vitality, ” and to embrace solidarity with what we are accustomed to excluding.
The project was exhibited once at the Ural Branch of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts in 2023. Curator — Zhenya Chaika Photography — Anya Marchenkova
