Nadya Tolokonnikova was in Berlin for a performance and is getting her first European solo exhibition as an artist. She remains as defiant as ever against Putin's regime.
Pussy Riot's performance at Berlin's Neue Nationalgalerie museumImage: Carsten Koall/dpa/picture alliance
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"We'll need a bit more space, because I will be screaming soon," Pussy Riot creator Nadya Tolokonnikova said as she and her group of performers lined up in front of Berlin's Neue Nationalgalerie, calling on the crowd massed in front of the museum to take a few steps back.
"And you know why I will be screaming?" added Tolokonnikova before launching her performance. "Because we women and queer people are encouraged to be quiet, and that's why we're going to take up our space now."
Among the several hundreds of supporters of the Russian feminist protest art collective gathered to see them perform live, many fans were wearing Pussy Riot's iconic balaclavas for the free event — just like the around 50 performers accompanying Tolokonnikova.
'Free all political prisoners!': Before the performance, the activists lined up in front of the museum and raised their fists, accompanied by pink smokeImage: Elizabeth Grenier/DW
Now an international movement with hundreds of people participating in their protest actions, Pussy Riot first grabbed the world's attention in 2012 after a guerrilla performance in a cathedral in Moscow. Their "Punk Prayer" performed in the collective's trademark colorful balaclavas got the group's founders, Nadya Tolokonnikova and Maria "Masha" Alyokhina, sentenced to two years in prison for "hooliganism motivated by religious hatred."
'Rage' as an art show
The Berlin performance was a one-night event promoting Nadya Tolokonnikova's exhibition at the OK Linz, an Austrian contemporary art museum. It is the first time solo exhibit of her works in Europe.
Nadya Tolokonnikova's conceptual performances and art against the Putin regime are at the core of her exhibition, 'Rage' Image: Manuel Carreon Lopez/kunst-dokumentation.com/OK Linz
The title of the exhibition, "Rage," is also the name of Tolokonnikova's last video work filmed in Russia. Police raided the video shoot — as shown in a documentary segment at the end of the music video. Participants were arrested for their involvement in a film shoot that "contains propaganda of homosexuality."
The video was released shortly after Alexei Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia from Germany in 2021, with Pussy Riot calling for the release of Putin's political opponent.
Following Navalny's death in a Siberian penal colony, rage continues to drive Tolokonnikova's actions.
She said she is also inspired by Navalny's widow, Yulia Navalnaya, who told her that it is important to not only feel grief following her husband's death but also rage.
"She used the exact word 'rage.' Rage is a very productive emotion. But I think it has to be used in the right way," Tolokonnikova told DW. "If you just have pent-up anger, it keeps bubbling up inside you and can eat you up, but if you let it out, go to a rally or make a gesture of political art, it can be great."
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On Russia's most-wanted list
Navalny's famous quote, "Love is stronger than fear," also continues to motivate Tolokonnikova in her work, which remains defined by fearlessness.
Her 2022 performance, "Putin's Ashes," directly confronts the Russian president. It shows Pussy Riot women burning a portrait of Vladimir Putin in the desert. The ashes of the fire are collected in little bottles.
'Putin's Ashes' are now an artwork on show at the OK Linz museumImage: Manuel Carreon Lopez/kunst-dokumentation.com/OK Linz
The performers accompanying Tolokonnikova in the video are "12 women from Ukraine, Belarus and Russia who experienced repression and aggression at the hands of the Russian president," according to a press statement by the conceptual performance artist.
Shortly after the video was released, Tolokonnikova landed on Russia's most-wanted list, a fact uncovered by news outlet Mediazona, the independent media outlet focused on anti-Putinist opposition that was founded by Pussy Riot's Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina in 2014.
Support for her Ukrainian friends
Tolokonnikova has since fled Russia, but lives "geo-anonymously" for safety reasons. The artist remains a prominent activist on the global scene.
Following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, she founded another organization curating non-fungible tokens (NFT) created by female, non-binary and LGBTQ+ artists. Through the sale of the organization's NFTs, she raised $7 million to aid Ukraine.
The 'Rage' exhibition is on show at OK Linz until October 20, 2024Image: Manuel Carreon Lopez/kunst-dokumentation.com/OK Linz
In her 2023 TED Talk, she spelled out why Russia is attacking its neighbor:
"Putin became intimidated by Ukraine choosing the path of freedom and democracy. That's why the Russian army bombs maternity wards, schools, hospitals, rapes and kills civilians and throws their bodies in mass graves. Putin and everyone who supports him are dead inside, and they must be defeated," said Tolokonnikova.
She held her talk shortly after finding out that she was on Russia's most-wanted list. In her speech, she also discussed why Putin sees her as a threat to his dictatorial system.
"Not because of any actual physical power I have, but because courage is contagious," she said. Courage, she added, is a power we all have: "It's a moral act to use this power. You may or may not achieve the results that you wanted, but there is eternal beauty in trying to find truth, in risking everything you've got for what's right."
Riot Days: Pussy Riot's acts of defiance
We take a look back at Russian punk provocateurs Pussy Riot and their remarkable defiance of political persecution and nationalist ideology in Russia.
Image: picture alliance / dpa
Starting a riot
All-girl Russian punk protest band Pussy Riot created an international storm in 2012 with a guerrilla performance in Moscow's main cathedral that called for the Virgin Mary to protect Russia against Vladimir Putin, who was elected to a new term as Russia's president a few days later. The protest attracted worldwide attention, and three members of the group were arrested.
Image: picture alliance / dpa
State censorship
During the ensuing court hearing in Moscow in August 2012, Pussy Riot members Nadya Tolokonnikova (right), Maria Alyokhina (center) and Yekaterina Samutsevich (left) could be seen in a glass-walled cage. Support for the Pussy Riot activists came from all over the world.
Image: Getty Images/AFP
Cause celebre
Pussy Riot's iconic colorful balaclava face masks allowed supporters near and far to become "members of the band." Here, a protester is arrested during a demonstration in support of Pussy Riot in 2012 in front of the Russian consulate in New York on the day a Russian judge found three members of the provocative punk band guilty of hooliganism.
Image: AP
No way out
Pussy Riot band member Nadya Tolokonnikova looks out from a holding cell during a court hearing in April 2013. Tolokonnikova was appealing her conviction for "hooliganism motivated by religious hate," for which she was serving two years in a remote prison. Many international stars such as Madonna called for the Pussy Riot members' release.
Image: Reuters
Back under attack
After their release from prison under an amnesty in late 2013, Pussy Riot were soon protesting again, this time at the Winter Olympics in the Russian city of Sochi. While they were preparing to sing the song "Putin Will Teach You to Love Your Motherland," a spoof on state nationalism, a Cossack militiaman who was armed with a whip attacked band member Nadya Tolokonnikova and a photographer.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo
Fight the power
Masked Pussy Rot members leave a police station in Adler during the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics in February 2014. Two members of the band, Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, were detained after they were wrongfully suspected of stealing a handbag from their hotel.
Image: Reuters
Getting the word out
By 2015, Moscow-based Maria Alyokhina (left) and Nadya Tolokonnikova increasingly traveled Europe to continue campaigning against Russian President Vladimir Putin. Here they answer questions from the audience at the 23rd Sziget (Island) Festival on Shipyard Island in Budapest, Hungary, on August 14, 2015.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/B. Mohai
Part of Banksy's world
Here, in September 2015, Pussy Riot's Nadya Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina performed at the closing party of the "Dismaland" project by graffiti artist Banksy. The street artist described his subversive, pop-up exhibition at the derelict seafront Tropicana lido in the UK as a "bemusement park."
Image: Getty Images/J.Dyson
How to start a revolution
Pussy Riot co-founder Nadya Tolokonnikova wrote her own guide to individual freedom in the face of totalitarianism, "How to Start a Revolution," which was published in 2016. She soon toured the book around the world, stopping in Berlin and at the Lit.Cologne literary festival (above).
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/R. Vennenbernd
Provoking the corrupt security state
In 2016, Pussy Riot were again indulging in political provocation at home, releasing a film clip to their new protest song "Chaika" that mocks corrupt and violent Russian security agencies – under whom the jailed band members faced "endless humiliations" – after it was revealed that the country's chief prosecutor, Yuri Chaika, had links to the local mafia.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/D.Sinyakov
Trump meets Putin
Pussy Riot's criticism not only targets Russian authorities: At this performance in a San Francisco theater in February, a caricature of Donald Trump accompanied Vladimir Putin on stage. During the event, they discussed the current state of human rights in Russia, and how LGBT individuals and political activists in prison are affected.
Image: Getty Images/T.Mosenfelder
The struggle continues
On August 6, 2017, Pussy Riot members Maria Alyokhina and Olga Borisova held flares and a banner on a bridge near a prison in Yakutsk, Russia to protest the jailing of film director Oleg Sentsov. He was arrested in Crimea – which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014 – and convicted by a Russian military court of conspiracy to commit terror attacks. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/Zona.media
Live in Germany
In September 2017, the group performed their "feminist punk manifesto" in Germany at Frankfurt's Künstlerhaus Mousonturm. Titled "Riot Days," the concert is based on band member Maria Alyokhina's eponymous book that describes her co-founding of Pussy Riot in 2011 with Nadya Tolokonnikova and Yekaterina Samutsevich.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/B.Roessler
Shutting down Trump Tower
In October 2017, the group stormed Trump Tower in New York City to voice opposition to Putin and Trump and the incarceration of political prisoners. Wearing their famous balaclavas, they held up a banner once again urging the release of Ukrainian film director Oleg Sentsov. Police closed the 58-story skyscraper for a half hour.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/J. Szenes
Protest on the pitch
Dressed as police officers, members of the collective invaded the pitch during the World Cup final in Russia, interrupting the game. According to the group, the goals of the protest were for the Russian authorities to free all political prisoners, stop illegal arrests at public rallies and allow political competition in the country. The members were sentenced to 15 days of jail time.
Image: Reuters/D. Staples
A suspected poisoning
One of the Pussy Riot activists at the FIFA World Cup protest was Pyotr Verzilov, who is also a publisher at MediaZona, an online news site that focuses on human rights violations in Russia's penal system. In September 2018, the dissident experienced symptoms of poisoning. He was sent to Berlin for treatment and was placed under police protection. He recovered.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/Cinema for Peace Foundation
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Edited by: Brenda Haas
DW's interview with Nadya Tolokonnikova was conducted in Russian by Natalia Smolentceva.
