In The Hunt, a new book released by English publisher Dewi Lewis, Spanish photographer Álvaro Laiz tells us the story of Udege people, in eastern Siberia, who have lived in the boreal forest for hundreds of years. Due to their close contact with nature, their beliefs are full of references to supernatural forces that they believe should be respected. In 1997 a Russian poacher called Markov came across the trail of an enormous Amur tiger. Despite the risk, Markov saw the tiger’s footprints as a promise for a better life. He shot the tiger, but was not able to kill it. Udege people believe that if someone attacks a tiger without good reason, Amba, the dark side of the tiger, will hunt him down. Without realizing it, Markov had unleashed the Amba. Over the following 72 hours the animal tracked him down and killed him. Later investigations suggested that the tiger planned its movements with a rare mix of strategy and instinct and most importantly, with a chilling clarity of purpose: Amba was seeking revenge. This animistic belief constitutes the leitmotiv to experience the impact of nature in the Udege communities across one of the last remnants of shamanism: the culture of the hunter.
Spanish photojournalist Álvaro Laiz was awarded this year’s grant for his haunting series “The Hunt,” which documents the Udege people, who practice shamanism in the heart of the Russian Far East. In Sight spoke to Laiz about his series and the motivation behind his work.
Thought to possess two spirits, the transgender women of Venezuela’s Warao people are seen as being close to the ancestor spirits that roam the jungle.
A chance encounter with an anthropologist in Caracas led Álvaro Laiz to Venezuela’s remote eastern edge, where an indigenous people known as the Warao have lived for millenniums.
