jeremy nicholl
Lenin Is With Us
More statues of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin were created than of any other historical figure. And although he purportedly disapproved of personality cults, the first was erected within 24 hours of his death. Soon the Soviet Union was saturated with statues of its founder. And after World War Two, the expansion of Soviet power into Warsaw Pact countries took his likeness even further afield. But with the end of Communism in Eastern Europe in 1989 and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, a rapid clear-out began. Thousands of Lenins were consigned to the dustbin of history or, if they were lucky, local museums. Just one country has remained immune to de-Leninisation: his homeland. Nobody knows for sure how many Lenins still gaze over Russia, so 30 years after the collapse of the state he founded photographer Jeremy Nicholl tried to find out. Travelling by motorcycle he covered over 50,000 kilometres in 2 years, crossing Russia from the European Union border, through Siberia to the Sea of Japan; from the Arctic Circle to the Caucasus Mountains and the palm-lined resorts of the Black Sea. And he found that, in the words of the Brezhnev-era song, Lenin is still with us. He towers over the Volga Canal. His vast head glowers down at Ulan-Ude. In countless town squares and parks he continues to harangue his fellow citizens. The photographs in Lenin Is With Us show how Russia is unable to shake off the spectre of its most famous son. A century after his death, the thousands of memorials across the country echo the words of the song: Lenin is with us, he is with us forever.
