Get to know the real Amstelveen: photographer captures all 139 nationalities

Anastasiia Dereviaha (30) looks at her photo that hangs on the wall of the small room on the ground floor of the museum. With her arm she clutches a white woolen house against her body, as if she is carrying her home with her. “I had to leave my home in Kiev behind.”

Ukrainian Anastasiia fled her home a year ago with her mother and cat. She now lives in Amstelveen, where she is sitting in the grass in the photo and staring at the trees in front of her. “The trees remind me of home,” she says, pointing to the canvas.

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Today, Anastasiia is accompanying a group of fifteen refugees from eastern Ukraine, who arrived in the Netherlands two months ago. “All my friends and family are still alive,” she says. “But it’s different with them.”

The group is coming to see Stephanie’s HOME Art Project today. The artist has come to the Cobra Museum especially for this. “You’ve lost your home,” says Stephanie, “but maybe there’s a particular Ukrainian recipe that reminds you of home.”

For her project, she took Amstelveners with different ethnic backgrounds to their favorite places in the city. On the spot she gave them a knitted white house, asked them to think of ‘home’ and took a picture from behind.

“Shooting them from behind shows their perspective of the world and you can better see emotions from behind, I think. When you shoot people from the front, they’re more concerned with their appearance.” According to Stephanie, the way they hold the house also says a lot about someone’s emotions around the theme of feeling at home.

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When the Ukrainian refugees go to see the rest of the museum, Stephanie takes her photo camera to the exit of the museum, where Ritikia Mehra (36) is waiting for her. Together they walk to the center of Amstelveen’s Stadsplein. “This square feels like home to me,” says Ritika.

In 1989 she and her parents came to live in Amstelveen as one of the first Indian families. As a child she spent a lot of time on the Stadsplein, because she lived close to it. “I now have an apartment in the Populierenlaan, a little further from the city center,” she says. “But after two nights I often go back to my parents: it feels more like home.”

Nowadays Ritika tries to help Indian expats on their way. “It is not always easy to intervene as a newcomer. The Dutch are quite closed. You often have to take the first step yourself.” Ritika organizes the annual event to allow different cultures to come into contact with each other Diwali festival.

‘I feel this too’

In addition to photos, the exhibition also shows quotes from the models, which show what home means to them. This is how Stephanie wants to connect people. “Then you can think: I feel this too. That quote can come from someone who comes from a completely different country and with whom you think you have no connection. I want to show people that maybe we are more equal than we think .”