page_title: Alex Gilbert
section_title: 2015–present: I'm Adopted project
hierarchical_section_title: Alex Gilbert / Career / 2015–present: I'm Adopted project
caption_attribution_description: English: Alex Gilbert - Anna Kuznetsova – Moscow, Russian Federation - November 2019
context_page_description: Sasha Alexander "Alex" Gilbert is a Russian-born, New Zealand-based adoption advocate. He is the founder of the project I'm Adopted which he established in 2015.
  Gilbert, whose original name is Gusovskoi Alexander Viktorovich was born in Arkhangelsk and was placed in the local orphanage for the first two years of his life until he was adopted by his New Zealand parents in 1994. In 2013 he started searching for his Russian birth parents, with whom he had no connection. He found his birth mother and then his biological father, who did not know about Gilbert's existence until Gilbert contacted him in 2013. The story of his search for his birth parents first aired on New Zealand television in 2014.
  In 2015 Gilbert created the project I'm Adopted to help people find their birth parents, and for families to search for their lost connections.
  Gilbert has made several appearances on television shows and documentaries about international adoption. He has also written two books, My Russian Side in 2014 and his autobiography I'm Adopted which was independently released in 2018.
context_section_description: In July 2015 Gilbert established the I'm Adopted project to allow other adopted people to share their stories.  The project is a platform that helps adoptees around the world to share their personal experiences with adoption through social media. The project also works to bring adoptees together through meet ups and events. The project is currently available in English, Russian and Spanish with the help of contributors and translators worldwide. 
  At the end of 2015, Gilbert appeared on Russian 1TV television station's  Let them Talk programme highlighting the project and his adoptive New Zealand parents meeting his Russian biological parents for the first time. As of March 2018 it has shared over 300 written or videotaped stories from adoptees around the world. Gilbert also helps organise support groups and meet ups with the I'm Adopted project for adopted people. The project was registered as a New Zealand charitable trust at the beginning of 2017. In February 2017, Gilbert was a key speaker at an event at the New Zealand Parliament to help raise awareness for I'm Adopted and its projects.
  In October 2017 Gilbert went to Russia to revisit his orphanage in Arkhangelsk. This was the first time Gilbert revisited the orphanage since he left in 1994. Gilbert also talked with adopted teenagers and parents in Moscow for a charity that focuses on adoption called Арифметика добра. Gilbert also met Anna Kuznetsova, Children's Rights Commissioner for the President of the Russian Federation for the first time, which was also headquartered in Moscow. Gilbert met her again in November 2019.
  Gilbert shared a video on his experience of him meeting his birth father for the first time on the social news website Reddit in November 2017. Since it was posted, the video reached over 250,000 views within three days and was also posted on the LADbible Facebook page which gained over 1.4 million views overnight. In January 2018, Gilbert appeared in a Russian documentary The Man from Nowhere «Человек из ниоткуда» which was directed by Katerina Gordeeva. In July 2018, Gilbert spoke via video at the ICAR6 (International Conference on Adoption Research 6) conference in Montreal, Canada as well as hosting the first I'm Adopted overseas meet up in Galway, Ireland, on 1 August 2018.
  In June 2019, Gilbert established the first podcast based on the I'm Adopted project along with announcing his upcoming television show Reunited.
caption: Gilbert with Anna Kuznetsova, The Children's Rights Commissioner for the President of the Russian Federation. Moscow, Russia November 2019
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "3330", "Image ImageLength": "2220", "Image BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8]", "Image PhotometricInterpretation": "2", "Image Make": "NIKON CORPORATION", "Image Model": "NIKON D5", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "3", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop 21.0 (Macintosh)", "Image DateTime": "2019:11:30 14:34:52", "Image Artist": "I\u2019m Adopted - REUNITED", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ReferenceBlackWhite": "[0, 255, 0, 255, 0, 255]", "Image Copyright": "I\u2019m Adopted - REUNITED", "Image ExifOffset": "444", "GPS GPSVersionID": "[2, 3, 0, 0]", "Image GPSInfo": "1020", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1134", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "5222", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/100", "EXIF FNumber": "5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Manual", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "5000", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0231", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2019:11:27 17:11:58", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2019:11:27 17:11:58", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "415241/62500", "EXIF ApertureValue": "290241/62500", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "3", "EXIF MeteringMode": "CenterWeightedAverage", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire", "EXIF FocalLength": "32", "EXIF SubSecTime": "83", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "83", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "83", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3330", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2220", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CVAPattern": "[2, 0, 2, 0, 0, 1, 1, 2]", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Manual Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "32", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "High gain up", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Hard", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0"}