We talk to Pussy Riot members Masha Alyokhina and Diana Burkot ahead of E-WERK Luckenwalde's 'Riot Days' - a multi-genre performance based on the group's anti-Putin protest action.
In 2012, the feminist performance art group Pussy Riot gained international attention for their guerrilla-style public performances that drew attention to the re-election of Russian President Vladimir Putin, challenging what they saw as corruption within the Russian Orthodox Church.
Dressed in fluorescent dresses and balaclavas, they would kick and punch the air to spiky guitar and pre-recorded backing tracks. The following trial and sentencing of two of its members, Masha Alyokhina and Nadya Tolokonnikova, attracted worldwide criticism, with Amnesty International designating them prisoners of conscience. After being released in 2013 and eventually fleeing Russia, Alyokhina and fellow original member Diana Burkot have been touring the world with an adaptation of Masha’s autobiography, Riot Days, for the past year.
I think we trigger Putin because we are women.
The performance piece you are putting on as part of Tell Them I Said No at E-WERK Luckenwalde (3-4 May) is based on your book Riot Days, an account of your early experiences in Russia. What made you decide to adapt it onto the stage?
Masha Alyokhina: I have a friend who is the co-producer of the show, Sasha Cheparukhin. He read the book and pushed me to bring it to the stage. It’s been a big collective effort, and I’m super happy we did it. But we’ve never done anything like it before. It’s not a concert, it’s not theatre or spoken word, it’s a combination of multiple genres and [art] forms. And the important thing for me to do is to tell my personal story so people can relate to it.
What message do you most want to convey?
MA: There are a lot of tough choices I made during my story, and it’s important to show people that everyone has the chance to make these choices too in their life. And it’s not necessary to be born inside a country where it’s quite clear who is bad and who is good. We all have the chance to act. We’re fighting against indifference. We want people to feel our experience, but we want them to understand that it’s them who are responsible for what is going on.
Diana Burkot: For us, punk is a way of life; we are a feminist, political art group. Some of us are activists, some are musicians and some artists. After Masha and other members, like Olga and me, left Russia when the war [with Ukraine] started, we wanted to use this performance as a tool, a manifesto putting our activism on the stage. And this performance is a chance to scream as much as possible about what’s going on in Russia. Wherever there is injustice, you need to fight for your freedom. It can be as simple as just voting. I always remind people that governments are just managers. We pay taxes for them, so they should work for the good of the people. No one is going to come and save you, it’s up to you.
In 2012, your Punk Prayer performance inside Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Saviour made international headlines. Back then, Putin had just announced his intention to run for a third term. Now, he’s been elected again for a fifth term. This must be enormously frustrating for you both…
MA: It’s not frustrating, unfortunately, it’s quite predictable. Since his first invasion of Ukraine and annexation of Crimea in 2014 he has slowly been taking away people’s freedoms. And by 2020, when the whole world was focused on the pandemic, he crushed the Russian constitution, allowing him to rule the country until 2036.It’s been 12 years since we started, and the country has changed a great deal. But our goal hasn’t changed – we’re determined to fight against this regime and to show the people of the West the truth.
Masha, you’ve described Russia as a “totalitarian hell”…
MA: If you do not believe that there is a hell in Russia, look to one of their main partners, North Korea. Putin’s goal is to rebuild the Soviet Union, finding new ways to occupy countries like Belarus. Its dictator, [Alexander] Lukashenko, basically allows Putin to do whatever he wants, like putting nuclear weapons on their land. He won’t have to declare a “special military operation” to invade former USSR countries, because the soldiers are now all effectively working for the Russians. And I’m not sure that people in the West understand just how dangerous the situation is.
Feminism in Russia is considered an extremist movement.
One of Pussy Riot’s first public performances took place on Red Square. Has it surprised you that more internal protests against Putin’s regime are not taking place?
DB: People always wonder why more people aren’t protesting on the streets. But there is so much danger. We have no independent media, no independent journalists go there anymore, so people are locked in a bubble.
MA: There are a lot of people who are against this regime, but you should understand that there is far more censorship since the full-scale invasion in 2022. If you even question the war, you can receive eight years in prison. There are lots of people who are against this regime, but it is naive and probably stupid to think that these people can just go to the Red Square and take the Kremlin, because they definitely can’t.
Masha, after Punk Prayer, you and two other Pussy Riot members were charged with “hooliganism” and sentenced to two years in prison. After serving your time, you faced multiple shorter terms. But when faced with an additional 21 days in a penal colony, you decided it was time to leave Russia for good…
MA: After what I had been through another 21 days really would not have made much difference! That’s nothing. I escaped to help Ukraine, the country that was fighting against the biggest authoritarian dictatorship on our continent. But it’s personal and political. My very good friend has lost two men in her family from fighting in the army and Pyotr (Verzilov), a member of Pussy Riot, is fighting there now for the Ukrainian army.
You escaped dressed as a food delivery person…
MA: We have a special department of police in Russia called Centre E, specially set up to fight against extremism. They call us terrorists. These people don’t wear police uniforms, they do not drive police cars or have any police signs. My building was surrounded by them, and a friend bought a food delivery costume when I was serving a 15-day term in a detention centre. There are thousands of couriers wearing this uniform in Moscow, so I wore it to exit the house and not be recognised. But then I was still a long way from Europe! They had taken all my documents. So, I had to find a way to cross the borders without any international passports.
Why do you think Putin meted out such harsh punishments for you?
MA: I think it’s quite terrifying for him to see any disobedience from anyone. But I think we trigger Putin because we are women. And since 2012, they’ve been trying to inject so-called traditional values into our society. But it’s such hypocrisy! Putin divorced his wife, and he had two lovers during his marriage. And even after the divorce, he did not marry his current girlfriend, who actually has several children with him.
DB: Feminism in Russia is considered an extremist movement.
This ties in with your outspoken criticism of the Russian Orthodox Church and its leader, Patriarch Kirill…
MA: Putin has used the church to provide sacred proof of his endless presidency, using the church in the same way Stalin did. In 1917, when the Bolsheviks took power, they crushed the institution of the church. Then during World War II, Stalin realised people needed religion and God because it’s scary to die and it’s scary to go to war and kill. So, he revived it and put top KGB [the Soviet Union’s foreign intelligence and domestic security agency] agents in its top positions.
DB: People need to believe they are dying for something more than they really are.
MA: When Putin took power, he just copied the Soviet Union’s idea of using the church as an organ of propaganda. Like Putin, Patriarch Kirill is a former KGB agent, and Putin chose to promote him. Now the church is basically calling to erase Ukraine, putting holy water on tanks and rockets, calling for women to have more children so it’s not so sad if one of their children dies in war. There’s nothing Christian about it.
DB: Patriarch Kirill is one of the wealthiest people in the world. Using the church to make money from selling alcohol and cigarettes. I find it really upsetting because helpless and desperate people really need the institution of the church but their message is to sacrifice your life and do whatever Putin wants.
People always wonder why more people aren’t protesting on the streets. But there is so much danger.
Diana, you believe that your collaboration with the Hip Hop Academy in Hamburg was cancelled because of your actions through Punk Prayer against the Russian Orthodox Church?
DB: Sometimes I make workshops because I really believe that we need to communicate with a younger generation, but I received a notification that this workshop and protest song I was going to write with them was going to be cancelled. I don’t believe it is the administration of the Hip Hop Academy. I think it is the Russian-speaking parents of the children who attend the academy who wanted it cancelled. It appears that the Russian community in Hamburg can dictate what takes place. We want to put a spotlight on this situation and there needs to be a public discussion.
MA: It’s sad and funny at the same time, that the local Russian-speaking community can force German people to cancel anything they want. They called our [Punk Prayer] action “old nonsense in the church”, which shows how invisible and strong the influence of Russian propaganda is, even in the West.
Are you worried at all about Putin’s agents ever catching up with you?
MA: We don’t have time to think about it. I’m living without a home, moving every two weeks, living from a suitcase. There’s no time to plan or think about security.
You are using this touring show to bring to attention political prisoners, like Alexei Moskalev…
MA: This is one of the most horrible stories to have happened in Russia last year. We have in total more than a thousand political prisoners. Some of them are activists, and some of them are just people who wrote a social media post. Alexei Moskalev is a single father. His daughter Masha made a drawing in the school of a person with a Russian flag shooting another person with a Ukrainian flag. The Ukrainian has his hands up as if to stop the bullets. It was clearly saying no to war and was a drawing for peace. But both of them were arrested for the discreditation of the Russian army. The girl was taken from the family to the orphanage and Alexei is now serving a long prison term.
Half of the profits from the merchandise you are selling from your show will be donated to the Ukrainian Children’s Hospital…
MA: We’ve collected more than €100,000 for this hospital. The children write us letters and send us photographs of the renovation work that they did. We don’t have a lot of money. We don’t have weapons to send to Ukraine. We understand that we cannot cover all the horrible things which the Russian state is doing in Ukraine but we want to bring something good to this country.
