We are delighted and honoured that Vladimir Shalamov of Prometheus Art and Alexander Gubsky of The Moscow Times have agreed to talk to the Society about protest art in Russia. The title of their illustrated lecture is A Hundred Years of Protest Art in Russia: From Tsarism to Putinism. Vladimir will provide an overview of the history of protest art in Russia: starting with the late Tsarist period; continuing with the period after October 1917 and through the 1920s when revolutionary/experimental art initially flourished but was then stamped on by the Bolshevik regime; the years of Stalinist repression in the 1930s when dissident art was impossibly difficult; and then the post-Stalinist period which was itself not without difficulties [(as illustrated by Khrushchev's angry outburst at the Manege exhibition in December 1962)].
Vladimir will go on to consider the last 25 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the striking parallels between the protest art in previous periods and that of today. He will make the point that protest art and artistic resistance to what the Kremlin is doing did not emerge yesterday, or even in recent decades, but have always existed.
Finally, Vladimir and Alexander will together explain to us the thinking behind the last three years of the Artists Against the Kremlin exhibitions in Amsterdam and why it is so important to draw attention to what is happening in Russia right now. They will describe some of the key exhibits from this year’s exhibition, which is titled Memory Remains, and will mention (amongst other features) the significant contribution to the exhibition made by Memorial, the archive section which focuses on punitive psychiatry [(i.e. the horrifying abuse by the State of psychiatry to repress dissent)] and the section of the exhibition curated by Feminist Anti-War Resistance.
Vladimir Shalamov was born in the city of Snezhinsk, Chelyabinsk Oblast. He studied at Gymnasium No. 127 and later graduated from Moscow University with a degree in public relations and was recognised as one of the “Best Graduates of Moscow 2004.”
Vladimir, who emigrated to Germany after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, is the founder of Prometheus Art, an organisation he describes as operating at the crossroads of contemporary art and civil society, producing what he calls "critical active art". The organisation works with artists from Russia and across the wider post-Soviet space to provide commentary on issues that can no longer be openly discussed within Russia - such as political and social freedoms and the right to criticise the regime, anti-war protest and LGBTQ+ rights.
Prometheus Art has a small gallery in Amsterdam where an ongoing exhibition programme is presented. It also partners with De Balie Arts Centre where for the last three years Prometheus has staged a special exhibition entitled Artists Against the Kremlin, which is then turned into a beautifully produced book. The two volumes published so far are Artists Against the Kremlin vol. 1 and Artists Against the Kremlin vol. 2, which are based on the exhibitions which took place respectively in 2024 and 2025.
This year’s exhibition, which – like the first two Artists Against the Kremlin exhibitions - is being co-organised with The Moscow Times, is again being held at the De Balie Arts Centre in Amsterdam and is titled Memory Remains. It opened on 14 August and runs until 6 September. One of the sections of the exhibition features an exhibition by Memorial called The Other Russia. MEMORIAL: 35 Years of Struggle for Historical Truth and Democracy.
Alexander Gubsky, the publisher of The Moscow Times, has worked as a journalist for [40?] years. The Moscow Times is Russia’s oldest independent media outlet and has been operating in exile in Amsterdam since March 2022. The newspaper is not only a bilingual news outlet in English and Russian, but also a bridge between East and West – a platform for dialogue, ideas and creative expression.