By MICHAEL KHODARKOVSKY
SEPT. 7, 2015
On Aug. 14, members of the ultraconservative Orthodox Christian organization, God’s Will, stormed into an exhibition that had just opened at Moscow’s storied exhibition hall, the Manezh. The exhibition, “Sculptures We Do Not See,” was a retrospective of Russian avant-garde art from the 1950-60s. The intruders smashed several pieces, shouting that the exhibits were offensive to Christians and that mocking religion was punishable under a criminal code. Four linocuts and a part of the sculpture installation titled “Beheading of St. John the Baptist” were damaged.
This is not the first time that members of God’s Will have used physical force against people or events they consider anti-Christian and anti-Russian. But violence against avant-garde art has a special resonance in Soviet history. The Stalinist Soviet Union had no tolerance for any form of art that deviated from officially approved socialist realism.
A year after Stalin’s death, three Moscow sculptors formed a workshop that launched a movement of “cellar nonconformism.” Known as LeSS, an acronym of the first letters of their last names — Vladimir Lemport, Vadim Sidur (often referred to as the Soviet Henry Moore) and Nikolai Silis — the workshop lasted from 1954 to 1968 and became legendary in Russian art. Unable to display avant-garde art openly, these sculptors supported themselves by continuing their work on grandiose Soviet monuments designed in the socialist realist style and intended to inspire patriotism. Like many Soviet writers who wrote “into the drawer,” that is, confining to drawers their work that had no chance of passing censorship, avant-garde artists, too, kept their art in the basement of their workshop hoping for a better day.
That day arrived in December 1962, when the first officially sanctioned exhibition that included avant-garde art took place at the Manezh. Soviet leaders personally attended the exhibition, and their reaction to it entered the annals of Cold War history as both a tragedy and a farce. The Soviet premier, Nikita Khrushchev, was outraged by what he called “degenerate” artworks that “distort the faces of Soviet people,” yelling that even his grandson could paint better and unleashing a long string of obscenities.
When Khrushchev threatened to deport the artists, the chief Soviet ideologist, Mikhail Suslov, standing next to him, suggested that they should be strangled. Khrushchev concluded: “Soviet people do not need such art!” The exhibition was immediately closed, and the next day the official daily Pravda condemned “abstractionism and formalism” in art. In fact, the closing of the exhibition marked the end of the “thaw,” a period of relative tolerance in the Soviet arts and letters.
In the following years, several attempts to exhibit non-official art were suppressed within several hours and accompanied by arrests and the confiscation of works. The most notorious case, which became known as “The Bulldozer Exhibition,” took place in September 1974, when a group of Soviet artists decided to set up an exhibition of avant-garde art in an open field on the outskirts of Moscow. Within half an hour, several bulldozers, water trucks and scores of undercover police officers arrived to disperse the exhibition. Some paintings were destroyed, many artists were arrested, and some eventually were deported from the U.S.S.R.
It is no wonder that the violence directed at the present exhibition touched a raw nerve among some Russians who remember the fate of avant-garde art in the Soviet Union. But the episode is also emblematic of how Vladimir Putin’s Russia differs from the Soviet Union. The crude and heavy hand of the Soviet police state has been replaced by far-right groups, such as God’s Will, that resort to intimidation and violence. In a way, the state has subcontracted its role as the guardian of morality to ultraconservative groups and organizations.
God’s Will’s violent actions coincided with Mr. Putin’s return to the presidency and the Pussy Riot protest against him in Moscow’s main cathedral on Feb. 21, 2012. Since then members of this organization committed dozens of violent acts: assaulting people, hurling insults, breaking into exhibitions, and disrupting performances and concerts. Despite numerous complaints, the Moscow police have steadfastly refused to initiate any criminal investigation.
After the storming of the exhibition at the Manezh, the leader of God’s Will, Dmitry Tsorionov, known as Enteo, was detained but quickly released. On Aug. 16, he was again in front of the entrance to the exhibition verbally assaulting a couple of elderly visitors and shouting that they should be sent to a labor camp.
The official representative of the Moscow Patriarchate has belatedly distanced the church from Enteo’s organization, and several government officials denounced the attack on the Manezh exhibition but stopped short of outright condemnation.
Official lip service notwithstanding, one cannot but notice a sharp difference between the ways the government reacted to Pussy Riot’s nonviolent protest and God’s Will’s violent actions. Three members of Pussy Riot were sentenced to various prison terms, and new legislation signed by President Putin in 2013 made “an offense of religious feelings” a crime. By contrast, no criminal charges have ever been filed against the members of God’s Will and their leader. There is no doubt that the Kremlin’s own deeply conservative values and policies have created an atmosphere of tolerance and impunity for the kind of right-wing extremist organizations like God’s Will.
In its culture wars and political schemes, the Kremlin has been increasingly relying on the support of fringe groups on the right both inside and outside the country. Best known is Mr. Putin’s open admiration for an extremist, right-wing motorcycle club, the Night Wolves. The president is often shown riding along and exchanging hugs with the leader of the club, Aleksandr Zaldostanov. The Kremlin has lavished the club of about 5,000 members with $1 million, while Mr. Putin personally awarded Mr. Zaldostanov a medal to honor his “patriotic work.” In exchange, the Night Wolves have vowed to quash any future anti-government protests in Moscow or elsewhere.
Desperate to save its bankrupt political system, the Kremlin has been increasingly moving to the right, forming a strong bond with the church and giving the green light to ultraconservative and extremist groups. In the end, manipulating violent and fanatical elements is always a dangerous game. One day the Kremlin may discover that the puppet masters have suddenly become the puppets of those they once controlled.
Michael Khodarkovsky is a professor of history at Loyola University Chicago.
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