He Smelled Like Empty Rooms

TSKALTUBO RESORT by Sasha Katz is a series of 12 AI-generated images based on the artist’s film photography. They are fragments of her memories and dreams from visiting the Tskaltubo resort with her parents when she was four years old. Presented as a sequence of photographs, it is as though she had a camera capturing those moments that shaped her understanding of love, loneliness, and magic, forever encapsulated in the echoes of the past.

"In the summer of 1988, my young parents took me on a vacation to the Tskaltubo resort, a renowned Soviet sanatorium nestled 15 kilometers from Kutaisi, Georgia. These grand institutions, surrounded by heavenly gardens, were the epitome of a perfect vacation. They were coveted by Soviet citizens for their idyllic neoclassical architecture, healing springs, massages, bathing procedures, immaculate air, and meticulously regulated diet food in the canteen — all included. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, these sanatoriums, including Tskaltubo, were abandoned, now lying in ruins covered with lush greenery.

During our stay, my mother, with her long, fluffy hair that I loved to brush, often sought solace in long solitary walks, lost in her own thoughts, occasionally pausing to hug me tightly. My father, with his fancy mustache, would carry me on his shoulders as we explored the gardens. In the evenings, my mother read Uncle Remus tales to me, and in the mornings, my father drew comics featuring anthropomorphic cats.

I didn’t appreciate the sanatorium diet food, and my parents didn’t have enough experience to convince a child to eat steamed vegetables, so they fed me fruit. They bought gigantic cherries and watermelons and washed them under the tap outside. I remember the sunlight reflecting off the cherries floating in the plastic bag.

Outside our room was a fountain with dark waters that seemed to hold secrets within. I had a vivid dream where I discovered a dragon living at the bottom of this fountain. We spent time together, sitting side by side. The dragon was silent and tranquil, and its presence gave me a sense of safety and peace that I had never felt before or since.

My memories of that time are a mix of joy and melancholy, overshadowed by the growing distance between my parents, who were drifting apart. They were trapped in a paradise they no longer wished to share. Yet, for me, their daughter, it was a time of wonder and magic, where I met my dragon. It was also the last time I saw my parents together—they separated after we returned from the resort."

– Sasha Katz