Touching with your Eyes

A Photo Essay by Alisa Oleva

I grew up in the suburbs of Moscow in the 1990s, with not much to own or to do. Because of this, walking and loitering have always been some of my main activities for fun. Later, I moved on to urban exploration and became part of a gang that was hopping onto roofs of trains, sleeping on rooftops, and walking miles along a highway or through a forest to get to an abandoned location. 

When I was 16, I moved to London. As a stranger in the UK without a fixed 'home', I mainly walked, turning the streets of London into my new home. So, walking has just always been there. At Goldsmiths I learned about walking art (that it even exists!) and I felt so happy and so at home. Ever since I have been making work that almost always involves walking in some way—for the audience, for myself, imaginary walking, simultaneous walking, audio walks, soundwalks...

During the COVID-19 lockdown in London, several people invited me to create walking scores. Suddenly, in the pandemic, walking was the only thing left to do. And it seemed best that we do it together, even if we were far away from each other. So I started doing various simultaneous walks, such as a Zoom Walk, and a piece using WhatsApp called Safe/Unsafe, among others. There were different cities: Moscow, Saint Petersburg, London, Ontario, Minsk, Tel Aviv, Edinburgh, and I engaged with different communities, as they took part in in my walks—the Walking Artists Network, parkour community groups, gallery mailing lists, etc. 

The walking score presented here was created for The Residents Association’s Unlocked Walks series. They are based in Edinburgh, but online sharing helped me to bring different audiences together across the world. Aware of the people who might like to join but do not have easy access to data, or who could not do the walk on the day, I hope that this walking score allows it to be re-enacted and walked into the future.