«Axis» was photographed in Svetlogorsk in 2023. At the center of the image is a thin line of wooden structure extending from the rocks in the foreground toward the horizon. It cuts through the still surface of the water and organizes the nearly empty space of the frame, turning the landscape into a strict visual structure.
The black-and-white treatment removes color from the image, leaving only rhythm, light, water, stone, and the tension of a straight line. This axis appears both stable and fragile: it directs the gaze forward, yet disappears into open space without offering a clear point of arrival. The work holds a contradiction that is central to Lola Graham’s practice — the desire for inner composure within a state of uncertainty.
For the artist, «Axis» is connected to a period of movement, fatigue, and searching for support. Yet the work does not turn personal experience into a direct narrative; it holds it through form. The minimalism of the frame becomes a way of speaking about direction, emptiness, and the attempt to preserve one’s own axis amid emotional noise.
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About the Author
Lola Graham
Lola Graham (Lola Mirmuminova) is a photographer and interdisciplinary artist. She was born in Korolyov, Moscow Region, and lives and works in Moscow. She came to photography after four years of medical studies, gradually leaving a predetermined career path to devote herself to image-making.
Her practice is shaped by three key ideas: minimalism, deconstruction, and unstable equilibrium. Lola is drawn to images that do not reveal themselves immediately: reflections, distortions, deep shadows, tense poses, and states suspended between familiar reality and a subtle sense of surrealism. Dreams, shifts in perception, and moments when reality seems to change form are central to her visual language.
Alongside photography, Lola works with analogue collage, printing, scanning, layout, text, and hands-on interventions into the photographic image. She is interested in glass, mirrors, water, lenses, textures, and traces of the hand — elements that allow a photograph to exist not only as a digital file, but also as a material object. In her work, the image often balances between precise observation and the feeling of a fragile, almost bodily surface.
At the center of her artistic inquiry are the body, skin, memory, human relationships, and the gradual erosion of contact between people in digital environments. Lola works with states of tension, fragility, distance, inner intensity, and transition. Her projects explore how the body interacts with space, surface, another body, and itself.
Main Exhibitions
Lola has been working in photography since 2019; her turn toward fine art photography and exhibition practice began in 2023. Her projects include «Unoccupied», «Carne», «(dis)placement», «Lightgate», and the forthcoming multimedia project on dreams, «Obsidian». Her works have been presented in group and online exhibitions including «THROUGH THE WALLS (AND BACK PT. 2)» in Barcelona, «SATORI» at Still Art Foundation/Moscow Multimedia Art Museum, «(Un)Written», «STREETS», «Happiness», «ARRIVAL», «Whispers in the Shadows», and «A New Feeling». Her projects and works have also appeared in media including Flanelle Magazine, F-Stop Magazine, Juliet Art Magazine, Goddessarts Magazine, The Kult Talk, Medium, and Time Out.
