| Page 2 of 2 < |
In Russia, a Gadfly Stings In Both Politics and Art
Marat Guelman, once a Putin ally and nationalist, quit politics to run a gallery in 2004. Last month, nationalists assaulted him for showing a Georgian artist's work. .
(By Vladimir Filonov -- Associated Press)
TOOLBOX
   Resize
COMMENT
 Discussion Policy
 CLOSE
Comments that include profanity or personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. Additionally, entries that are unsigned or contain "signatures" by someone other than the actual author will be removed. Finally, we will take steps to block users who violate any of our posting standards, terms of use or privacy policies or any other policies governing this site. Please review the full rules governing commentaries and discussions. You are fully responsible for the content that you post.
Who's Blogging  |
But Guelman says he has come to believe that Russia is atrophying under the Kremlin's centralization of power. "This entire concept of a vertical of power, a state machine, is a false concept," he said. "I believe it's a huge mistake. I believe it's a deep personal problem of Putin. He can only manage systems like this."
In 2004, Guelman broke with the Kremlin and retreated to the world of art. A year later, he organized the exhibition "Russia 2," a counterpoint to the official "Russia 1" exhibition in which any treatment of Putin, the Orthodox Church and Chechnya was quietly forbidden.
"Russia 2" tackled all three subjects, including a lifelike sculpture of a female Chechen suicide bomber under a crumbling Soviet statue. Another piece by a pair of Russian artists who call themselves Blue Noses was a portrait of the artists as Putin, Jesus Christ and Alexander Pushkin, the 19th-century Russian writer. And a series of posters by the artist Avdey Ter-Oganyan, who lives in Western Europe because of death threats, mocked religious anger at his anti-clerical art. One black poster with two pink circles stated: "This painting publicly humiliates the Patriarch of Russia, Alexei II."
The newspaper Kommersant wrote that he was trying to create "a cultural space parallel to the Russia in which creative, dynamic and independent-thinking people cannot fulfill themselves, the Russia 1 of Vladimir Putin."
Not everyone was taken with the new dissident artists. A group of Orthodox Christians filed a criminal complaint against Guelman and the artists alleging that the exhibition insulted religious people and incited hatred. The complaint was dismissed this year, but Guelman said he has been receiving death threats.
Earlier this year, a member of parliament, Nikolai Kuryanovich of the ultranationalist Liberal Democratic Party, put Guelman on a list of 100 enemies of the Russian people that is circulating on the Internet. The list followed the release by Guelman of a list of 100 alleged neo-fascists.
Because of the beating and what he views as an increasingly poisonous atmosphere in the country, Guelman said he is considering getting back into politics. He said he has already done some focus group work and polling to see what kind of opposition could be created to challenge pro-Kremlin parties in parliamentary elections late next year. He refuses, however, to discuss what form a new party might take or with whom he is working on the project.
"I thought I wouldn't get back into politics, but after what happened to me, this is very realistic now," he said. "Unfortunately, we don't have an opposition. If we're going to create something, it would have to be new. Certain people will participate. If this happens, we'll see in spring."
For now -- with his mother hovering in the background -- he's nursing his wounds and working on reassembling Djikia's exhibition. "We reopen November 9," he said.
