Recover is a project about overcoming depression. It is based on my personal experience of dealing with this condition. For a while, I've been wondering about the nature of social stigma surrounding depression and other mental health issues.

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I've noticed that mental health issues are all too often being perceived as untreatable and definitive, even though a lot of them can be successfully cured. Recover focuses on the process of healing instead of documenting the realities of dealing with the condition.

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In psychoanalysis, it is believed that depression is caused by the loss of an object and is, in effect, 'mourning' over something important being lost. Recover states that everything changes and that every void seeks to be filled with meaning. It's always darkest before the dawn.

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Bio

Olga Kuzmenkova (Moscow, 1988) completed a Master's degree in Journalism at Moscow State University. Worked for a range of independent media organizations, left Russia in 2014. She lived in Riga, Latvia, and, in the end, moved to London, UK. In 2018 and 2019, she attended evening photography courses at Central Saint Martins, UAL, to learn the basics of photography and studio work. In 2019 she enrolled in a year-long course in art photography at the Russian school of contemporary photography, 'Docdocdoc'. After completing the course, she decided to stay at school for another year in order to continue her photographic education.