Legend has it that the copper for America’s most famous sculpture — the Statue of Liberty — was produced at the metallurgical factory of Nizhny Tagil, one of the industrial centers of Russia’s Ural region.
Russia
Posted inOpinion
Artists Confront the Uncomfortable Legacy of Lenin
This week, two men made headlines when they doused the tomb of the Soviet Union’s first leader Vladimir Lenin with holy water while reportedly shouting “Rise up and leave!”
Posted inIn Brief
Why Did Russia’s iMonument Disappear?
A public statue of an Apple iPhone installed in St. Petersburg, Russia as a memorial to Steve Jobs was removed on Friday, allegedly in response to the tech company’s new chief executive, Tim Cook, coming out as gay.
Posted inArt
A Child’s Drawings Preserved over the Centuries by “Magical Mud”
In one region of Russia, the consistency of the earth is just right that manuscripts dating back centuries emerge almost perfectly preserved. Over the past year, more than 1,000 of these birch bark artifacts from the 11th to 14th centuries have been exhumed from the soil of Novgorod, adding to a growing archive of written history.
Posted inNews
750-Year-Old City Founded by Genghis Khan’s Grandson Is Unearthed
It’s hard to imagine a time when present-day Russia didn’t exist. But along the banks of the Volga River in modern-day Saratov, a reminder is being unearthed.
Posted inArt
After Alleged Attack, Making Sense of a Chelsea Exhibition’s Murky Backing
On October 3rd, an assailant and two accomplices allegedly entered the cavernous gallery at 540 West 21st Street in Manhattan’s Chelsea district. What happened next, according to reports published here and in the New York Times, was an assault of the curator, Benjamin Hiller, with pepper spray, and the apparent partial defacing of the exhibition on view.
Posted inOpinion
Vladimir Putin’s Birthday Art Bash
Pop quiz: What’s the best way to celebrate the 62nd birthday of a “democratic” leader with dictator-like tendencies?
Posted inArt
Picturing Russia’s Central Asian Diaspora
Travel to Russia these days, and chances are the person serving you your food is a visitor to the country, too. Every year, 5-6 million Uzbek, Tadjik and Kyrgyz people arrive in the country to work in restaurants, construction sites, farms and manufacturing plants. They are maids, taxi drivers, street sweepers and garbage collectors. In Krgystzstan alone, one quarter of working-age citizens live outside the country.
Posted inIn Brief
Long-Running Moscow Art Fair Canceled
A key Russian contemporary art fair has been canceled in its 18th year, and appears unlikely to return, The Art Newspaper reported.
Posted inIn Brief
Pro-Russian Separatists Kidnap Artist in Ukraine
Pro-Russian rebels have abducted an artist in eastern Ukraine, the International Business Times reported.
Posted inNews
Pussy Riot Members Sue Russia for Violation of Human Rights
Maria Alekhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, the two former members of punk feminist group Pussy Riot whose trial and imprisonment in Russia drew major attention from the West, are suing Russia in the international European Court of Human Rights.
Posted inArt
Resisting the Russian Pull: Armenian Artists Speak Out
YEREVAN, Armenia — The Russians are not just trying to exert themselves in Ukraine; they are actively staking claims to their irredenta throughout their former territories. The opposition in Armenia has lacked the drama and intensity of the resistance in Ukraine and Georgia, but there is a small artistic challenge to what many are calling the Russian recolonization of the area.
