For Moscow-born photographer Kristina Makeeva (Instagram), magic isn’t fantasy, it’s observation. Known for her global project Simple Magic Things, Makeeva has spent over fourteen years seeking out wonder in the everyday. Her work, which has appeared in exhibitions from Seoul and in collaborations with Adobe Photoshop, blurs the line between travel documentary and visual poetry.
Among her far-flung journeys, one destination stands apart: Yemen’s Socotra Island, a place that reshaped her creative vision and, in many ways, her purpose as a photographer.
When a friend first showed her images of the island in early 2021, Makeeva was astonished she had never heard of it. “It looked like Jurassic Park,” she recalls. Closed to tourists for years, Socotra reopened with limited flights from Abu Dhabi just as global travel restrictions began to ease. Makeeva and her team took one of the first flights, an uncertain leap of faith that led to the creation of some of her most celebrated work.
On Socotra, she found a landscape untouched by modern tourism: dragon blood trees bleeding crimson sap, bottle trees blooming against white sand dunes, and emerald springs reflecting the bluest skies she had ever seen. “It was wild, raw, and absolutely magical,” she says. Living in a tent, washing in lakes, and photographing under the Milky Way, Makeeva documented the island’s surreal ecology and humanity with awe and respect. Her series not only introduced millions of viewers to Socotra through social media but also highlighted Yemen’s fragile natural heritage in a moment of rediscovery.
“Socotra isn’t about comfort,” Makeeva reflects. “It’s about seeing the planet as it once was, untouched, generous, alive.” In her lens, the island becomes both subject and metaphor: a reminder that beauty, however remote, can still shape how we see the world.
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