Maria Kiseleva, activist and author of the icon Pussy Riot
IN RUBRIC "BUSINESS"We acquaint readers with women of different professions and hobbies that we like or are simply interested in. In this issue - a member of the art group "Grandmother after the Funeral", the author of the icon Pussy Riot and one of the organizers of the monstrations in Novosibirsk Maria Kiseleva.
I study at the Novosibirsk State Academy of Architecture and Arts as a designer. This is such a strange place: an absolutely ordinary educational institution that lives by Soviet standards, we are even forced to teach GOSTs of the 60s. The history of art ends there on the Wanderers. And then they say: "Well, of course, there were avant-garde, but I will not tell you - you still will not understand." And when you really start to consult with them about work, they say: "Well, we will not advise you: why should we create competitors in the market for ourselves". We have a teacher at the academy Kostya Skotnikov, an artist from the Blue Noses art group. This is the only teacher who is interested in communicating with young people. I studied with him an academic drawing when I said that I was interested in modern art. He began to give me books, websites. I was greatly influenced by the books of Groys.
The creative group "Grandmother after a Funeral" (BPP) is two people: me and Artem Loskutov, who manage to create a sense of the progressive public of Novosibirsk. Artyom is older than me, and he earlier began to engage in activism at the intersection of art and politics. Every year on May 1 we spend monstrations in Novosibirsk. Several thousand young people gather on the streets with some witty funny posters - this is an absolute shock. First of all it is a shock for the city hall. My mother goes to the monstrations, but she does not walk in the crowd, but stands at the side and listens to what the cops and deputies say. And now they are standing and thinking: “No, well, how much money do they have? Even if they paid 300 rubles each, how much? Where?” It never even occurs to them that people just need a breath of fresh air, a general get-together, where everyone could come and have a good time.
We can not find a common language with these people. We even had such a poster: "There’s nothing more to say about you." How can we demand something from people who do not even perform their official functions? We do not know this protocol, semi-bandit language, and we don’t want to communicate with it on it, so we invent some absurd aphorisms, continuing the traditions of Kharms and Prigov. Before the monstration, we spend a lot of time in the mayor’s office, arguing endlessly with all these guys who sit there and just don’t understand what it is. And here I start: "Well, you see, carnival culture, everything is fine." They: "No, we do not understand why this is necessary?"
In 2009, Artem had a story with the Center "E": on the eve of the monstration, 11 grams of grass were planted on him, and he spent a month in the SIZO. It was a loud story, and the next year several thousand people came to the monastery. I do not understand where all these people are during the year? And suddenly, on May 1, they come out as if from some other world. Everyone is smiling, screaming. Now it can not be quit: last year there were people who said that if we no longer hold our monastery, they will do their own Orthodox monastery.
You do not have to go through any institutions like galleries, but through prison, and then you are an artist
I knew Artyom for a long time, but I didn’t like him wildly. And then he served a month in the SIZO, left there and changed a lot. In general, I hold the opinion that a prison, if it is a month or two, has a very beneficial effect on a person. You sit and reread your work all day long - or just alone with yourself. And you think over your every action, remember everything you said, did. And it really reveals a person, especially when you don’t know if you will stay a month or three years. Artem changed it so much - he became much deeper, much more serious. Prison gives the skill to answer for their words, because as soon as you say something wrong, you will have problems. And you start thinking about each phrase. He matured much and began to live more meaningfully. After that we started dating.
I have so many acquaintances, friends who have been in prison and are now there, I have heard so many stories about this prison life that I already have the full feeling that I myself was there. If I find myself there, I may not be confused. Katya Samutsevich participated in many actions of "War", but no one considered her an artist before she left the prison. It turns out that you should not go through any institutions like galleries, you should go through prison, and then you are an artist. A prison is a rite of passage, a rite of initiation.
We knew "War" remotely. In 2010, Artem and I first came to Moscow and met Petya and Nadya (Petr Verzilov and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova. - Approx. ed.). The “war” also split into two factions: the St. Petersburg and Moscow factions, and we became friends with the Moscow factions.
Pussy Riot are people with whom we are familiar, whom we support in some way, in some way we do not support. When Artem was sitting, the first support actions were organized by Petya and Nadya. There are people with whom you do not communicate every day, and then it is these people who give you support. We thought that something had to be done as soon as they were arrested on March 3, because then neither Paul McCartney nor Madonna were present. We discussed this with Artem, and the idea to draw the icon was on the surface. We drew it, went at night and placed it in these advertisements, chose empty lightboxes so that there would be no vandalism, opened our icons, closed them, took pictures. They were immediately removed in the morning. But someone managed to take a picture, and somehow everything went. We wrote a post that "behold, Artem and I walked and watched a miracle. We went and saw an empty advertising structure. We looked at this lightbox, and suddenly an icon began to appear there. And we decided that we could not keep silent about it, because these miracles rarely happen and humanity needs to know about them. "
We explore the boundaries of what is permitted. The boundaries that are not set by society, as it should be, but by the state machine from above
When was the trial of the curators Yerofeev and Samodurov (organized by the Forbidden Art 2006 exhibition - Approx. Ed.), we wanted to do this: come to court with three thousand large Madagascar cockroaches. And here we went there, the ushers approached us: "You have a bomb there, let us search you!" We: "No. Don't search us!" And they immediately: "Yeah, you have a bomb there!" In general, we could not get into the courtroom itself. We with Artem still had to document everything. And so that all this did not disappear, at this moment Petya jumps onto the bench, and I remember how, in slow motion, how he opens this box of Choco Pie and disperses these cockroaches. And we stand in the rain of Madagascar cockroaches. And I understand that I have the whole bag, I'm all in them. I look at Artyom, he is also full of them. And the screams began for the whole court. The mess begins. It was not that ugly. It was ugly, when we left the court, the time had passed, maybe 10 minutes, we had already thrown off everything. We stand with Artyom, and he is wearing a shirt, and I see that there is only one such shirt-shirt out of the shirt. Usami moves. And I: "Artem, he is still here! They are with us!" He: "Take it off! Take it off! I can't take it anymore." And we ran. Then they threw him off somehow. But since then I have no prejudice towards insects.
We explore the boundaries of what is permitted: what is allowed in this society and what is not. And at what point these boundaries shift. And unfortunately, this activity is inextricably linked with criminal practices, because we still exist in a particular state, and these very borders are not set by society (as it should be), but by the state machine from above. And we try to interact with her, figuring out what she is capable of and how she will react.
Now I am drawing a book about drug addicts: heroin women, methadon women, such serious ladies. This will be a graphic novel. I thought for a long time in what form it is to draw. We were in Perm on “White Nights” and went to the Piotrovsky shop, where we found a book about medieval manuscripts with miniatures. All this aesthetics prodded me wildly. In general, this whole topic with drug addicts is reminiscent of the Middle Ages. And I decided how to state the lives of these women: there are lives of the saints, and I will have a story about the life of the heroin Lena. If you exaggerate and simplify, then God is love, and the life of the saint tells us about the search for this love. After I talked with these women, I realized that their whole life was looking for the real love that they could not get and did not know what it was.
Art is associated with the overthrow of idols. This is exactly Malevich’s quote that I really like: “We must destroy the icons of the old world.” It is necessary to bring down idols, this clears the mind.
If you ask me: "What are your political views, Masha?" - it may sound funny, but I believe in anarchy. I do not believe in God, I believe in anarchy. Anarchy tells us about the personal responsibility of each member of society, who must reasonably think enough to be responsible for his actions, not in front of the judge or the prosecutor, but in front of himself. Then in life there will be much more common sense. We do not say that everyone should live in bad apartments. We say that everyone should live in the apartments that they need. Capitalism spins a person to buy completely unnecessary things to buy insanity, which, like, renews your life, but in reality these are just scenery, where you often don’t see your life and don’t see yourself.
Photographer: Maria Sumin