EUROTOUR (2019–2022)

Artist book, performative lecture

Paris, Berlin, Kassel, Arcis, Leipzig, Varna, Warsaw, Trebbia, Fère-Champenoise, Ostrolensky, Kvarken and others — nearly 20 villages in the south of the Urals, Russia received their names from European toponyms. The origin of each is linked to the foreign military campaigns of the Russian Empire or the history of suppressing national liberation uprisings of the 18th–19th centuries. This peculiar “Ural Europe” contains a bouquet of narratives tied to the formation and assimilation of ethnic identities and languages, and to the forced displacement of peoples.

Bogomolova’s journey through the region was initially conceived as a study of how tourist experience is constructed, gradually turned into a tour through colonial history, and eventually became an investigation into how new markers of glorification and the militarisation of society are superimposed on the mental map of this territory.

In February 2022, the research was first suspended and then closed. Reflecting on this work and the conflict between aesthetics and ethics in projects dealing with difficult heritage is ultimately documented in the artist book "216,566 rubles and 62 kopecks spent on the Eurotour project with no results" (2025).