Otto Snoek (b. Rotterdam, 1966) first visited eastern Ukraine in 1989. In twelve months, spread across six trips between 1989 and 1992, he photographed Ukrainian cities and the countryside in the latter years of communism. Snoek documented a poor and desperate country and presented the resulting work as his graduation project at the St. Joost Academy in Breda. During that period of travel and work he laid the foundations for his continuing career as a photographer. Over the years Otto Snoek became fascinated by public spaces that function as junctions, such as squares and shopping centres. He calls them social centrifuges and turntables, where everything and everyone seem to congregate.