Life Here Is Serious

Life Here Is Serious is a small numbered volume from Rob Hornstra and Arnold van Bruggen's Sochi Project, gathering Rob Hornstra's color portraits of boys and young men training as wrestlers in the North Caucasus.

The book collects 28 photographs across 48 pages, including one fold-out spread. It was issued as the second title in the project's self-published Sketchbook Series. That series released material from Hornstra and van Bruggen's long-term field research between larger publications. Wrestling runs deep in the region's culture. It is prized there as both sport and a route out of poverty. Hornstra photographs his subjects plainly, straight-on, against bare gymnasium walls. The marked and worn training clothes carry as much of the story as the faces do. The edition was limited to 750 numbered, hand-bound copies with blue cloth boards and a printed title bookplate.

Hornstra and van Bruggen worked together for years as the Sochi Project. They documented the North Caucasus and the Russian Black Sea coast in the run-up to the 2014 Winter Olympics. The project produced dispatches, sketchbooks, and the large-format Sochi Project: An Atlas of War and Tourism in the Caucasus. Hornstra is the photographer. Van Bruggen, a writer and filmmaker, provided the text and reporting.