Published: New York Times Style Magazine
May 2008

 

Bortnikov's dwelling began as a hole in the garden covered with boards, later augmented with found materials, like pieces of parquet floor from the renovation of Versailles. When Bortnikov had trouble writing, and Ostroverhy had trouble painting, they attached themselves to each other with a 20-meter chain, so that neither could leave his work space. Bortnikov wrote his novel on bedsheets; he insisted Ostroverhy provide him with a day's ration of food and cigarettes only when he had filled a sheet. In 2002, his novel "Fritz's Syndrome" was a finalist for the Russian Booker Prize.
Ostroverhy served in the French Foreign Legion and also worked as a professional fireman. (The local pompiers frequent the Territory.) In addition to drawing massive pencil-on-canvas portraits of firemen, he remains obsessed with the destructive power of fire. To live in the Territory, one must follow 135 rules, which include elaborate habits of communication (via walkie-talkie) and egress (everyone must master exiting in one minute, with passport, laptop and pants), so that no one will ever be harmed in a fire.