I decided to take this photo because in my opinion, it nails the context in which it all happened. It is easy to move around Pripyat and experience it as a place belonging to another dimension, completely detached and different from our life, so far from our daily life that its almost feeling as it didn’t happen for real. There are places in Pripyat, however, where this bubble of disbelief bursts, and this photo, in my opinion, is a perfect example. The presence of something so common such as a television, in such a context of destruction, brings back everything into well-defined boundaries. This place struck me for this simplicity in such a context, but there’s also a simple story behind, and a much happier one, which contributed to raise the contrast between this tv and the devastation all around. This facility once contained 3 shops; Musical instruments, various household appliances and spirits. At the end of the month, when the husbands didn't come back at home at the usual time, they knew that coming here they would find them drinking and playing instruments, which is why the women of Pripyat started calling this place the Bermuda Triangle.
An empty television at the entrance of a complex of shops selling musical instruments, liquors and televisions.