Maria Alyokhina - Riot Days

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Neither Fish nor Fowl

(Neither cunt, nor the Red Army)

Old Russian saying

We came up with an idea to make a film about the revolution. A real movie that would be shown in every theatre. Filming a frozen chicken being pushed up a cunt was good, but it wasnt for a mass audience. Art for the masses is made in Hollywood. Revolution requires a big screen.

We visited at least twenty studios during one week: identical offices, snow-white smiles. Getting appointments was easy for us we were stars in all the newspapers.

We want to make a movie about revolution.

Which revolution might that be?

The Russian revolution.

What do you mean? The 1917 Revolution?

No! The one thats happening now.

But there is no revolution now.

Oh, really?

Perfect teeth. Suntanned bodies. Morning runs in sneakers.

Well buy your story if youre selling it.

But what about the revolution?

The summer was over. Darkness fell early. Putin announced he would run for a third presidential term.

The magical winter of 2011. The Snow Revolution. What will they write about it in the history books? Will they mention it at all? What will become of it will it be the beginning of a bigger revolution that lies ahead? We were led by a belief in the possibility of change a naive and childish belief that can awaken suddenly in adults, and is usually accompanied by feelings of shame and the need to justify oneself. We went out into the streets. We wrote and, letter by letter, we became a revolutionary statement. We wore white ribbons.

revolutionary writing

That winter, the little grey KGB agent Putin and a puffed-up, toy-like Medvedev decided to trade places: prime minister for president. Or maybe one of them decided who cares? They called it castling, two pieces moving on the chessboard at the same time. They falsified the results of the elections to the Duma.

We believed that, if we pricked his ass with a pin, Putin would jump out of his presidential seat. He would leap up, and run to hell. His fleshy, Botoxed cheeks would head for the hills and roll off into the dustbin of history.

anyone can be pussy riot

I began to stay at the Bass Players place, and joked about academia. Its rotten and mildewed, I said. The Bass Player lived on the outskirts of town in a tall building. In her apartment, there was a portrait of Beethoven and a faux-leopardskin blanket on the sofa. We talked until five in the morning and watched Pasolini movies a lot.

We loved only heroes. The 1968 student revolt in France, the Russian avant-garde in the early decades of the 20th century. At the same time, we were reading Alexander Vvedensky, a poet who was murdered by Stalin on a convoy somewhere between Kharkov and Kazan on its way to a penal colony. One weekend, I locked myself in the room where the Bass Player burned CDs. I was going to make a stencil for a T-shirt. I decided I had to make a revolutionary T-shirt. I didnt even notice when it got dark.

revolutionary t-shirt

When I went back out into the kitchen, it was full of girls. The Bass Players floor was tiled in black and white squares, like a chessboard. The girls were wearing brightly coloured dresses. They were arguing so loudly it must have been audible two floors down.

Check out the T-shirt I made, I said. I was very proud of the first T-shirt Id created myself.

Cder un peu, cest capituler beaucoup!

Cder un peu, cest capituler beaucoup! was stencilled on the T-shirt in black permanent marker. I had spent about five hours on it. The T-shirt was green. The girls were furiously cutting holes in colourful knitted balaclavas.

On the night of 4 December, there was a march along Chistye Prudy, past the FSB buildings, where prisoners are kept. Red fires from the flares. Temperature: 39F. Wind: 5mph. Relative humidity: 88%. Haze. Arrests.

39F, 5mph, 88%

The prisoners are hanging out a banner written with markers. Markers are banned in prison. They hang it up outside the bars, stretching their hands through the gaps. It reads: Judge Moskalenko burn in HELL.

The judge didnt burn in hell. She lives in it. She still works in the Russian court. The beginnings of the revolutions first large-scale street protest were underway. A really massive street protest, right by the Kremlin wall.

The riot police were in position. We entered Revolution Square, 10 December 2011.

you cant even imagine we exist

In January, we, Pussy Riot, started rehearsing in an old factory. After a while, the security guards were no longer surprised to see us. Oh, those girls are here again. Wearing strange-coloured tights, some weird headgear. Russias a strange place, anyway. Katya said, Its odd that they never ask us any questions. She thought there was something fishy about the way they let us come and go. But the security guards were just doing their job, drinking beer and watching TV.

This is one of their whims. They send nine people to one place, twenty to another; in some countries, they dont think its necessary to send any at all. If they want to teach something, they should teach their wives to make cabbage soup!

Vladimir Putin on European observers at Russian elections, 2008

little whims

You need at least one month of rehearsal to put an action together. When you go live, you only get one take.

You walk through a large hall in an old factory, put up a ladder, climb up on to the windowsill one by one. Shout out a song. 30, 40 times in a row.

get ready

With a large, heavy backpack, after every rehearsal, I took the last, nearly empty bus to the metro and jumped over the turnstile just in time to catch the train. I never had enough money to pay for the ride.

jump

The Kremlin is alarmed. The TV denies anything unusual is going on. Condoms the word Putin used to describe the oppositions white ribbons. He meant that those who did not agree with him were just protection for a limp dick. Yeah, right.

putin peed his pants

The little towers of the Kremlin were dark; the snow was white. They used to execute people on Lobnoye Mesto.

On Lobnoye Mesto, theres a round stone platform that looks like an executioners block. Its surrounded by stone walls that are maybe six feet high. Its like a large barrel cut in half. Inside, it can hold about thirty people.

In Red Square, directly facing the Kremlin.

The tsar read out decrees ukases here. And declared wars.

In 1968, eight dissidents climbed on to Lobnoye Mesto to protest against the invasion of Czechoslovakia.

for freedom yours and mine

It was an unprecedented protest in Soviet Russia. The authorities responded with prison sentences and forced psychiatric treatment.

In the 1990s, Alexander Brener, an artist who had been incarcerated in a Dutch prison for drawing a dollar sign on a painting by Kazimir Malevich, hopped around Lobnoye Mesto in his underwear and boxing gloves. He shouted at the Kremlin, Come out, Yeltsin!