After an attack last week by Russian Orthodox fundamentalists who damaged works of art in a Moscow exhibition, Mikhail Piotrovsky, the general director of St Petersburg’s State Hermitage Museum has urged the country’s cultural institutions to hold self-defence courses.
In an open letter published on the museum’s website on Monday, 17 August, Piotrovsky proposed that Russia’s museums “immediately organise in-house training on protecting the state of their exhibitions, taking into account that as of November of this year, police will stop physically guarding museums”, due to budget cuts. He added that the Russian Museums Union, of which he is president, is looking to take legal measures against vandals.
Piotrovsky also said the recent attack is “a new provocation against the Russian Orthodox Church, an attempt to present it as primitive and aggressive, and to hinder efforts being carried out right now by museums and the church to reach harmonious relations”. He ended the letter with a stark declaration: “Our society is sick.”
Last week, a group led by Dmitry Tsorionov, often called Enteo, nearly destroyed works by Vadim Sidur (1924-86), a Soviet avant-garde artist and sculptor, that were on display at the city-run Manezh exhibition hall near the Kremlin wall. Tsorionov says the works are sacrilegious, because they depict Crucifixion scenes in which Jesus is shown with genitals.
A video posted on the LifeNews website shows Tsorionov rail against purportedly offensive works and tear them from stands. He was detained only briefly and told Russian media on Monday that he would not even pay a small fine.
Liberals in the church and the art world say that Tsorionov’s actions could be compared to Pussy Riot’s 2012 “punk prayer”, and that they could have similar repercussions on Russia’s cultural atmosphere.
UPDATE, 22 September 2015: The RIA Novosti news agency reports that a Moscow court found Enteo guilty of petty hooliganism and sentenced him to ten days in prison. Supporters who accompanied him, including two priest, held a prayer service in the corridor.
For more on the sacred battle between Russian museums and the Orthodox Church, read our feature in the July/August print edition.
