Fine Art 2nd place winner

All of us experience an inner dialogue. We have a mental image of ourselves that we are talking to almost every moment of our life and about anything: hopes, troubles, Sunday shopping, memories from the past, what the person standing next to us thinks about us. Every person’s identity is split into two parts “me” and “myself”. The project is exploring the interactions of these two different sides of the same person and idea the of the duality of a human mind and self-discovery.



These parts don’t represent “good” and “evil” in general sense of those words. Often, one of these parts is our inner critic, the punisher, the one that comes up with all the fears, excuses and negative thoughts. This “me” can make us fail at anything since this voice will never be happy, it thrives on suffering, recreating it in our heads over and over again, often without any connection to a real-life situation we are in. It’s the job of the other part, “myself”, to recognize the negative delusion and turn it into healthy positive thoughts thus bringing peace to our minds.

Dasha Pears is an award-winning Russian conceptual photographer, currently based in Helsinki, Finland. Dasha’s unique style is dreamlike and whimsical. Her works tell stories that combine real life and surrealism, making the viewer stop and think.

She started her photographic path in 2011, after reaching burnout in a marketing communications career. Having tried many types of photography, Dasha found herself in the conceptual and fine art sphere. Since then her images have been exhibited in Russia, France, Poland, Austria, and Finland. Her work was also named among the winners of Best of Russia’15, had an honorable mention during Trierenberg Super Circuit 2017 and 2018 photography contests in Linz, Austria, and won a bronze medal during Prix de la Photographie Paris, 2018. Dasha’s photographs are used worldwide by companies like Trevillion, ArcAngel, plainpicture and Millennium Images, and can be found on covers of books published in Europe, the United States and South America.



In 2016 Dasha started sharing her experience of organizing conceptual photography shoots and producing surrealist artworks in the form of creative photography workshops. Since then she has held over 15 events in Finland and abroad..