The Kunstkamera

“I’m forty years old. It’s time to sum up and start understanding myself. So, I’m a coward, I’m shy, I take life too seriously. And finally, I don’t know how to fantasize.” (Andrey Astvatsaturov, “Skunkskamara”)…

This book is for everyone who loves engaging stories. I read it and smiled. “Skunkskamara” provokes a special kind of laughter—a squeaky one that leaves a bitter aftertaste. The world of Astvatsaturov is a world of whining, of slouching existence—a world, or a little world, that charms me personally. (Sergey Shargunov)…

“Skunkskamara”—is Astvatsaturov’s city, a space: enclosed and sharply smelling of the fear of the observer; a cabinet of curiosities, an open-air panopticon, where oddities and absurdities are displayed from three empires that have followed one another—tsarist, Soviet, and liberal. (Lev Danilkin, “AFISHA”)