Russian 2K17 (also known as Vermite Moy 2017 / Bring Back My 2017) is a Russian hybrid digital-everyday aesthetic from 2016–2018, combining new school music, comfortable street style, post-irony, and the everyday realities of post-Soviet suburbs—nighttime strolls, apartment building entrances, panel apartment buildings, concerts, house parties, and school hallways. This aesthetic is primarily associated with Gen Z.
The aesthetic is heavily centered on VKontakte (VK), specifically the culture of "Sohry" (Сохры)—the "Saved Photos" albums on user profiles where teenagers curated low-resolution, high-contrast images of urban decay, neon signs, and emotional quotes.
History[]
The aesthetic emerged with the development of "new musical" (new wave, Versus) and frequent "saved photos" on VK (2016). Russian 2k17 aesthetics weren't a carbon copy of Tumblr, although they were partially inspired by it. It localized trends: Tumblr melancholy became sad saves, Vaporwave and its derivatives became panels, Sadboi aesthetics featured personalities like Face, Элджей.
Philosophy[]
"We are who we are." This aesthetic shaped a collective identity. "We capture life as it is felt from the inside." From a historical perspective, this context conveys life in the new Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union. That is, aesthetics has become a hybrid, namely a meeting of the global and the local, a digestion of global trends within the framework of the Russian mentality.
Codes[]
1. Visual: T-shirts with "Sputnik 1985," "Yunost," and other brands; prefabricated houses in various shades; photos in the style of "out of focus, flash, night street"; lights, garlands, windows of prefabricated buildings; teenage bedrooms with carpets, glowing garlands, and laptops.
2. Text: short captions: naive, painful, sincere; post-ironic quotes; phrases that were valuable not for their meaning but for their intonation (usually song clippings); disses as a form of controlled aggression.
3. Social: "Life in saved files," threads and personal dramas in VK public groups, the cult of friendship that goes hand in hand with cultish loneliness, the romanticization of uncertainty, alcohol, and cigarettes.
Media[]
Songs[]
- PHARAOH – Black Siemens
- Feduk & Элджей - Розовое вино
- Gazirovka - Black
- Pharaoh - Дико, например
- Face - Бургер
- Элджей - Минимал
- Эндшпиль – Малиновый рассвет
- Филипп Киркоров - Цвет настроения синий
- Грибы - тает лёд
Resources[]
VK publics[]
Pinterest Boards[]
Gallery[]
