ABOUT

Anthony Suau's remarkable visual document opens with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. From there the book examines the monumental process of Communist societies struggling to transform into open-market economies. This timely book illustrates the widening gap between politicians in Moscow, who struggle to represent business as usual in the international political arena, and the Soviet people, who are in turmoil at home. A powerful vision of the future is reflected in the faces of men who cheer on the hammering of the Berlin Wall, yet the working conditions for the average factory worker, as seen in Suau's 1992 photograph, appear to be unchanged from those in the 1930s. From the horror of mass graves in Chechnya to the giddy frenzy of Moscow nightlife for Russia's nouveaux riches, Suau's photographs capture a war of hope and despair that appears to be at the point of explosion.