RUBLJOVKA - STRASSE ZUR GLÜCKSELIGKEIT

Rublyovka Road is the traffic artery connecting the powerhouse Moscow with the Russian outback. At all times, the region bordering on Rublyovka has had always a magnetic attraction for the ruling elite classes: tsars, dictators, presidents. Of course, also present-day head of state Putin resides here. In Putin's Russia, Rublyovka has become synonymous with wealth, social ascent and decadent lifestyles. Tell-tale signs of the past and gross excesses of Russian cutthroat capitalism have created a bizarre microcosm that does not have a parallel elsewhere in this giant empire. Nouveau riche upstarts have caused prices of properties on the Rublyovka to rocket sky-high, and the fight for the last remaining pieces of land has broken out. The last huts of the poor are swept aside to make way for the palaces of the wealthy by means that could not be any more unfair or brutal.