Art and Politics -- War and Peace

"This wasr has made me realize that the country I thought I lived in didn't actually exist -- it was an illusion."

Art is meant to be international, somethong that belongs to all humanity. But now we are cut off from that international world."

"Some of my parents' friends say that Russia doesn't need contemporary art. They call it degenerate foreign propaganda."

Evgenia, 23, staff member, GESp2, graduate, Stroganov Applied Arts Academy, Moscow

"About 80 percent of the young people who work with me signed -- but for some reason the city demanded that we dismiss only four of them. One of the four hadn't even signed the open letter, but he had shared an [antiwar] post on Instagram."

"I refused to fire anyone. So far there haven't been any consequences, but we are all waiting to see what will happen."

"There are no hard-and-fast laws. We don't have official censorship. Nobody comes and checks what we are exhibiting, nobody tells people what to post and what not to post, yet people are being fired and sent to jail for things they share on social media."

"Nobody knows what is permissible and what is not. It's worse than the Soviet Union."

Director of Moscow museum

"We decided it would be unethical to work with any state institutions in Russia as long as the state is waging this war."

"We could be locked up for our public position in opposing the war. Can you imagine?"

Tatiana Arzamasova, member, AES+F group

"The Moscow government's department of culture is run by patriotic cyborgs. Absolutely everything is now about patriotism, from cinema to the visual arts ... Most [of the art world] is against it, but people are too afraid to speak out."

"[GES-2, Garage and other contemporary art spaces are coming under] strong pressure to change their profile towards exhibiting Russian patriotic art I don't think they are ready to do that."

Nic Iljine, veteran curator

At a former power station-turned contemporary art centre known as GES-2, a stone's throw away from the Kremlin, young Muscovites wander through the cavernous halls, pose for selfies admiring the designer space. In Gorky Park, the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art hosts hipsters sipping mochaccinos in the cafe. In both trendy art galleries meant to house contemporary art there is actually nothing to be seen. Russian and foreign artists withdrew their work from Garage, GES-2 and State Tretyakov Gallery.

 

The Roman Abramovitch-bankrolled Garage where his ex-wife Dasha Zhukova is the chief officer, announced suspension of all future exhibitions "until the human and political tragedy that is unfolding in Ukraine has ceased". "We cannot support the illusion of normality when such events are taking place ... We see ourselves as part of a wider world undivided by war", explained a spokesperson.

 

The GES-2 gallery funded by billionaire Leonid Mikhelson, opened late last year by Vladimir Putin himself to great fanfare, has lost its artistic director, Francesco Manacorda who chose to resign in protest at the outset of the war. Anti-war protesters occupied another art centre in Venice, owned by Mikhelson. The multimillion-dollar GES-2 project could be compared to the Tate Modern. Garage threw a party full of Western celebrities in the arts when it reopened in 2015 in a new location. 

Mere days following Russia's February 24 'special operation' in Ukraine, authorities in Moscow began cracking down on critics of the regime. Those in the media, theatre and art worlds were particular targets. Over 17,000 Russians employed in the arts had signed an open letter on the third day of the war, demanding an end to the invasion. Leading bureaucrats from the Department of Culture of the Moscow City government to start calling around state-funded theatres and museums to demand they fire any employees who signed the petition.

Pussy Riot raised $6.7M NFTs Getty Images

The State Duma in early March passed a law making the "distribution of false information" about the war, even mentioning it as a war rather than the official description of a 'special military operation', punishable by up to 15 years in prison. Thousands of journalists, political activists and creative professionals took the opportunity to leave the country, among them many of Russia's most prominent artists.  The Bolshoi on the other hand, announced it planned to stage a series of performances supporting Russia's war in Ukraine, proceeds to go to families of Russian soldiers who die in combat.

A large Z -- a symbol of support for the war -- was posted across the three-storey facade of the Oleg Tabakov theatre in central Moscow. St.Petersburg artist Alexandra Skochilenko last month was arrested for replacing supermarket price tags with messages to protest Ukraine's invasion. And for that unspeakable crime she faces up to ten years in prison on charges of 'discrediting the Russian army.

"[The war has caused] tectonic plates to shift ... everyone is in a new world now. There could be a creative explosion like in the 1920s ... both in propagandistic and anti-propagandistic art."

"Or we could be heading into a swamp where art becomes military and religious and imperial. Artists are being forced to make a choice."

Nikita Scriabin, Moscow graphic artist