James O'Brien
It’s tough to get a handle on Pussy Riot, often described as a punk rock band from Russia. Like the brightly colored balaclavas that members often appear in, the women’s individual identities are intentionally obscured. Best known for their performance art and provocative punk songs, three members of Pussy Riot were arrested in 2012 for performing “Punk Prayer” (“Virgin Mary, Put Putin Away”) at a Moscow cathedral.
That action led to the arrest and imprisonment of Yekaterina Samutsevich, Nadya Tolokonnikova and Maria (Masha) Alyokhina on charges of “hooliganism.” Since the women were released from a penal colony two years later, Pussy Riot has grown into a multimedia movement; today, in addition to making music, members are doing investigative journalism and writing and performing in political theater troupes, continuing to call attention to Vladimir Putin’s expansionist and totalitarian state.
These days, Tolokonnikova has been working with a producer in Los Angeles to create videos under the Pussy Riot brand. Her disturbing “Make America Great Again” video imagines a Trump-led America, while “Straight Outta Vagina” is a more playful tune: “If your vagina lands in prison, the world is gonna listen.”
But Tolokonnikova is not part of the current U.S. Pussy Riot tour, which is billed as a “Q&A” rather than a concert. The audience at Wisconsin Union Theater on Nov. 17 will get to ask Alyokhina and Sasha Bogina questions. In advance of their Madison appearance, they both answered questions from Isthmus via email while on an epic 30-hour journey that began in Utrecht, the Netherlands, and wound up at their first U.S. tour stop in Cornell, New York.
In 2014, Pussy Riot members Nadya Tolokonnikova and Masha Alyokhina appeared in a video showing solidarity with Wisconsin protesters being arrested for singing in our State Capitol. Why did you decide to weigh in on Wisconsin’s workers’ rights struggles?
Alyokhina:When we saw the words of Scott Walker and reaction to the protesters, we felt that we needed to support them. At this moment America has a much more difficult test in the face of Donald Trump, and it is important for you to look to the example of Russia, the country in which a fucking bastard took the presidency.
It’s a little hard to figure out who’s doing what in Pussy Riot. Is there much activity (actions or songwriting) as a group, or are you going separate ways?
Alyokhina: Pussy Riot, in four years time of existing, experimented with genres a lot. It happened ’cause we love experiments. When Vladimir Putin and his officials in 2012 [took] balaclavas from three of us, thousands of people around the world put balaclavas on to support us. Since that moment Pussy Riot can be called a movement, not a group.
Masha Alyokhina: “It is important for you to look to the example of Russia, the country in which a fucking bastard took the presidency.”
You and Nadya Tolokonnikova spent two years in prison. What has happened since then?
Alyokhina: After our release in 2014, we founded Mediazona, an independent media that covers all topics related to freedom (unfreedom) in Russia: prisons, violence, political trials.
You are involved in political theater, including a play called Burning Doors. What is that about?
Alyokhina: Burning Doors is about resistance between artists and authorities. We made it together with Belarus Free Theatre, an underground theater group from Belarus. Our play is a part of the campaign for freedom for Oleg Sentsov, a Ukrainian filmmaker [sentenced to] 20 years of prison in Russia.
How did the experience of prison change you?
Alyokhina: I believe that every experience is useful, [and] that’s why I do not regret anything. After two years in the penal colony I’ve understood that the prison system is a mirror of Putin’s political system. I’m not something special. Each of us has a story, and each of us makes a choice at some point in our lives. The main thing here, I think, is do not lie to yourself and remember that history is written by all of us.
Tell us about Mediazona.
Bogina: Mediazona is a small online news outlet founded by Maria, Nadya and Peter Verzylov, shortly after the girls were released from the penal colonies. Nowadays, there are about 20 people working for this project in a small newsroom in the center of Moscow. Most Mediazona journalists and chief editor Sergey Smirnov used to work for Russian Planet; many people have left its team after facing censorship.
What kind of journalism happens there?
Bogina: Mediazona was founded with the idea that the history of Russia is written in the courtroom, so you need to actively monitor various trials if you want to understand the situation in our country. Mediazona is known for our online reports from trials, for example of a Ukrainian politician and former Army aviation pilot, Nadia Savchenko, and a Russian performance artist and political activist, Peter Pavlensky. We are covering the murder case of Russian politician Boris Nemtsov, who was shot dead in the center of Moscow in February 2015, as well as the case of a young blogger, Ruslan Sokolovsky, who was arrested and charged with extremism and insulting people’s religious feelings after playing Pokémon Go in a church of Novosibirsk. Just recently, Anna Kozkina reported on torture in prison #54 in the Sverdlovsk region and slave labor in one of Mordovia’s penal colonies. One of her most important articles was the story of an orphanage in the Trans-Baikal region, where children were humiliated, beaten, starved, tied to the door and subjected to sexual violence.
What is going in Russia that you wish people in the United States knew more about?
Bogina: In my opinion, people in both Russia and the U.S. need to know more about the cases of violence against prisoners, censorship in the media, domestic violence, police violence and other cases of human rights violations in both countries. It is kind of upsetting that the image of Russia in the Western media is largely formed by the image of our government. Seriously, Russia is a huge and multicultural country. I would like to see people in Western countries get rid of stereotypes about Russia and Russians. (Russians should get rid of stereotypes about the West as well.) This may sound silly, but I believe that people around the world should communicate more and explore other countries beyond the media headlines.
Editor's note: This article was corrected to reflect the correct date of the Q & A event: Nov. 17.
