Are We the Problem?: Pussy Riot in the USA

This week, former Pussy Riot members, Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova have been in the United States performing at an Amnesty International Concert featuring Madonna, the Flaming Lips, Imagine Dragons, Lauryn Hill and others. Maria and Nadia also showed up in a long and very funny segment on the Colbert Report with Stephen Colbert opening with the brilliant line -- "Welcome to America. Have you been to Olive Garden yet?" They hadn't, to which Colbert quips, "that's good, because you'll feel like you're in Italy."And yet, while this was happening stateside, the Pussy Riot members were wheedled out of their group on the other side of the globe as the other Pussy Riot members used this moment to separate themselves from Maria and Nadia. Below is the letter posted on the group's livejournal page.

An Open Letter from Pussy Riot

We, the anonymous members of Pussy Riot, would like to say many thanks to all the people who have supported us all this time, those who demanded the release of our members, those who sympathized with us and sympathized with our ideology. We are very grateful to all of you, we deeply appreciate and respect everyone who has contributed to the overall Pussy Riot campaign at this difficult for us time.

Our joint efforts were not in vain: Putin had to bend under the pressure of the international community and let Nadia and Masha free.

Thus, December 23rd was a real celebration for us — the Liberation Day of prisoners of conscience and the real victory of the liberation of the entire Pussy Riot.

But the amnesty is certainly not the end of our dreams. We demand real justice: the complete abolition of the verdict and the recognition of the entire criminal case against Pussy Riot, illegitimate.

We do hope that the justice will be restored on February 21 — the anniversary of our teasing performance in the Christ the Saviour Cathedral, with the song " Mother of God, Put Putin away!"

We are very pleased with Masha's and Nadia's release. We are proud of their resistance against harsh trials that fell to their lot, and their determination by all means to continue the struggle that they had started during their stay in the colonies.

Unfortunately for us, they are being so carried away with the problems in Russian prisons, that they completely forgot about the aspirations and ideals of our group — feminism, separatist resistance, fight against authoritarianism and personality cult, all of which, as a matter of fact, was the cause for their unjust punishment.

Now it is no secret that Masha and Nadia are no longer members of the group, and they will no longer take part in radical actionism. Now they are engaged in a new project. Now they are institutionalized advocates of prisoners' rights.

And as you know, such advocacy is hardly compatible with radical political statements and provocative works of art, that raise controversial topics in modern society. Just as gender conformity is not compatible with radical feminism.

Institutionalized advocacy can hardly afford the critique of fundamental norms and rules that underline the very mechanics of modern patriarchal society. Being an institutional part of this society, such advocacy, can hardly go beyond the rules set forth by this society.

Yes, we lost two friends, two ideological fellow member, but the world has acquired two brave, interesting, controversial human rights defenders — fighters for the rights of the Russian prisoners.

Unfortunately, we can not congratulate them with this in person, because they refuse to have any contact with us. But we appreciate their choice and sincerely wish them well in their new career.

At the moment, we are witnessing an outrageous collision:

While Nadia Masha are being the focus of media and the international community, they gather crowds of journalists and people heed to their every word, so far no one hears them.

In almost every interview they repeat that they left the group, that they are no longer Pussy Riot, that they act in their own names, that they will no longer engage in radical art activities. However, the headlines are still full of the group's name, all their public appearances are declared as performances of Pussy Riot, and their personal withdrawal from Pussy Riot is treated as termination of the entire collective, thus ignoring the fact that at the pulpit and solea of Christ the Saviour Church, there were not two, but five women in balaclavas and the Red Square performance had eight participants.

The apotheosis of this misunderstanding was the public announcement by Amnesty International of Masha's and Nadia's speech at a concert in Barclays Center in New York, as the first legal performance of Pussy Riot.

Moreover, instead of the names of Nadia and Masha, the poster of the event showed a man in a balaclava with electric guitar, under the name of Pussy Riot, while the organizers smartly called for people to buy expensive tickets.

All this is an extreme contradiction to the very principles of Pussy Riot collective:

We are all — female separatist collective — no man can represent us either on a poster or in reality.

We belong to leftist anti-capitalist ideology — we charge no fees for viewing our artwork, all our videos are distributed freely on the web, the spectators to our performances are always spontaneous passers by, and we never sell tickets to our "shows."

Our performances are always 'illegal,' staged only in unpredictable locations and public places not designed for traditional entertainment. The distribution of our clips is always through free and unrestricted media channels.

We are anonymous, because we act against any personality cult, against hierarchies implied by appearance, age and other visible social attributes. We cover our heads, because we oppose the very idea of using female face as a trademark for promoting any sort of goods or services.

The mixing of the rebel feminist punk image with the image of institutionalized defenders of prisoners' rights, is harmful for us as collective, as well as it is harmful for the new role that Nadia and Masha have taken on.

Hear them finally!

Since it happened that Nadia and Masha chose not to be with us, please, respect their choice. Remember, we are no longer Nadia and Masha. They are no longer Pussy Riot.

The campaign "Free Pussy Riot" is over. We, as art collective, have an ethical right to preserve our art practice, our name and our visual identity, distinct from other organizations.

The fact that Nadia and Masha are no longer in the group was not necessarily news. Both appear almost sad when Colbert mentioned it on his show, and given their treatment in Russian prisons, and their renewed focus to look at reform, it seemed likely that there wouldn't be time for both. So, what is this letter all about? 

Obviously, a quick read of the letter reveals that there's a lot of context that we're not privy to based on ideological differences as well as differences in the group. Masha and Nadia brought attention to Pussy Riot, but in so doing also broke the anonymous code of the group that of anonymity. Perusing the Rolling Stone article detailing the Amnesty International concert, on the right hand side of the page, you can see what might anger the anarcho-feminist collective when you see:

I don't imagine that shot fitting in nicely with the Pussy Riot agenda. And the group, as the last paragraph of the letter shows, had to do something to wrest their identity back from these two women, or it would be impossible for the group to continue to exist.

The concert at the Barclay's Center was no doubt the last and no doubt the largest straw. The line-up  and guest list provided a dictionary definition of cause célèbre: Yoko Ono, Susan Sarandon. The coverage of the event is typical fawning rock journalism speaking of "inspiration" and cracking jokes at the same time. For a group that champions feminist ideals, everything was bought up pretty fast--codified, eroticized, marketed, and co-opted. Really first rate work, Capitalist machine. I apologize for the cynical tone here, but after watching the first-rate documentary on the group, Pussy Riot:  A Punk Prayer when they do the part about Madonna dedicating "Like a Virgin" to the group, I couldn't help but roll my eyes. I'm sure somewhere deep down in that Detroit heart of hers, there's something that really feels something about the unjust imprisonment, but it's hard to separate that from the seeming eons of opportunism which she's used to stay relevant for three decades. Once Madonna got involved, you could see the anarcho-feminism coming to a head real quickly.

Ironically, it seemed to be nothing that the group actually did which has lead to this rift. Certainly, in the middle of a trial which will take you away from your family, you're not going to keep up your indie cred and be like, dude Madonna sucks, I'm so pissed she dedicated a song to me, that's bullshit, and why "Like a Prayer" anyway? Furthermore, Nadia and Masha's primary goals, at the moment, are related to prison reform, which every prison (maybe outside of some European ones) needs. Badly. And who better than two women who had to suffer, unjustly and very noticeably, these conditions to try and help fix them?

Rather, it is the group's foundation--anonymity, direct action--which makes the split from Masha and Nadia imperative. Pussy Riot is an idea which gathers the collective around itself. It's an idea that we're not used to in the United States. Here, we fall onto political action through stars who "raise awareness" of an issue. This fundamental discrepancy between the two systems are what allow for our system to continue. Stars are necessary, because it lets us put a face with a cause. It's quantifiable, easily disseminated, and better to sell. Even our "charitable" or "humanitarian" causes need to be sold. And it's this capitalistic necessity which runs under the critique of Nadia and Masha's appearances in the USA from Pussy Riot's statement. 

Unfortunately, for both Masha and Nadia, there seems to be no turning back. Now outed from the group, they are continuing their work without the surprise of anonymity which has allowed them to continue their performance for so long. But, in closing, let me offer this. There is no greater statement than that which is held in performance, because a performance, by its very nature, is unable to be regulated, controlled, or captured. The live essence of a performed moment is transitory and fleeting all the cameras and technology in the world will not change this. Performance exists only in the nexus of relationships and here, too, is where true art and political action are born. 

We (and here I'm talking mostly about the USA) are the problem, we're also a way to help with the solution. Because, there is a certain anonymity in we -- as a collective, a group, a totality -- as well as there is a stake that we all have in action to fight oppression, undermine corruption, and create a more just world. The question becomes, if we're the problem, can we solve ourselves?