Borderland

From 10 July to 3 September, ISSP Gallery presents Borderland, a solo exhibition by photographer Reinis Hofmanis exploring Latvia's eastern border region, its landscape, and the everyday lives of its inhabitants. The exhibition opens on 9 July at 6:00 pm. Since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the border has transformed from a relatively inconspicuous administrative line into a permanently guarded and fortified space. Fences, surveillance towers, patrol roads, and other security infrastructure have become part of the landscape. At the same time, cross-border connections – long an integral part of everyday life for local communities – have diminished significantly, while the border region is increasingly perceived as the external frontier of the European Union and NATO. Through a visual documentation of Latvia's eastern borderland, photographer Reinis Hofmanis examines the border as a changing space that not only reshapes the familiar landscape but also affects people's daily lives, their environment, and their sense of belonging. At the heart of the project is a visual investigation into the materialisation of the border within the landscape. It reveals how geopolitical tensions and security policies gradually transform the abstract notion of a border into a physical reality that occupies an increasingly visible place in the surrounding environment. The borderland emerges as a multilayered territory: on one level, it is a tangible landscape marked by fences and military infrastructure; on another, it encompasses the intangible layer of people's stories and memories that transcend physical boundaries; and it also points toward a future in which the border functions as an infrastructure of preparedness and the management of potential threats. The project focuses on transformations of the landscape, military and civilian infrastructure, and traces of human presence, revealing how global political processes become embodied in a specific territory and its visual details. The people encountered during the project speak about their hometowns, which, as a result of historical events, now lie in other countries; about family homes that today stand beyond border fences; and about everyday life in places where the border has become a permanent presence. Reinis Hofmanis (b. 1985) is an artist and photographer. He studied photography at Hannover University of Applied Sciences and Arts in Germany and holds an MA in Visual Communication from the Art Academy of Latvia. His work is characterised by a socio-anthropological approach, expressed through an interest in documenting and typologising different social groups, their patterns of behaviour, and the environments they shape and inhabit. Hofmanis received the Archifoto Grand Prize in 2012 and 2013, won Second Prize in the Architecture category of the Sony World Photography Awards in 2013, and was awarded the Fujifilm GFX Challenge Global Grant Award in 2024. His work has been published in The New York Times, Financial Times, Der Spiegel, Bloomberg, Le Monde, Esquire, The Globe and Mail, and The British Journal of Photography. Curator: Iveta Gabaliņa Exhibition team: Santa Ozoliņa, Elizabete Vuškāne, Aldis Bušs, Aivars Purmals The exhibition is supported by the State Culture Capital Foundation of Latvia and the Riga City Council.