UKRAINE-CRISIS/CZECH-ART Prague exhibition charts fate of Donetsk's Izyiolatsya cultural centre

Record ID: 151336

  • Title: UKRAINE-CRISIS/CZECH-ART Prague exhibition charts fate of Donetsk's Izyiolatsya cultural centre
  • Date: 11th June 2015
  • Summary: (SOUNDBITE) (Russian) FOUNDER OF IZOLYATSIA, LUBOV MIKHAILOVA, SAYING: "The Donetsk People's Republic decided that the cultural centre, whose main principles were freedom of speech and expression, was not necessary in the Donetsk People's Republic. People with machine guns came to us, made three "control shots" into the air and told us that now humanitarian aid from Russia
  • Embargoed: 26th June 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Czech Republic
  • Country: Czech Republic
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA6MHA6VBJFJVHM7JVMUO9BY3WF
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Prague's avant-garde DOX gallery on Thursday (June 11) opened an exhibition by the documenting the fate of Ukraine's Izolyatsia cultural centre.
    Izolyatsia was founded as a "platform of cultural initiatives" in 2010 and was situated - like the DOX gallery in Prague - inside a former insulation products factory in Donetsk.
    "At the time, this was the first cultural centre of this type in Ukraine and it was a centre where, with the help of culture, we wanted to change the social structure of society, we wanted to use culture as an instrument to change the post-industrial situation in the region," Izolyatsia founder Lubov Mikhailova said.
    The project continued for four years until June 9, 2014 when the foundation was seized by representatives of self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic. Representative from the centre say its offices and galleries were looted and wrecked over the following months.
    "The Donetsk People's Republic decided that the cultural centre, whose main principles were freedom of speech and expression, was not necessary in the Donetsk People's Republic. People with machine guns came to us, made three "control shots" into the air and told us that now humanitarian aid from Russia would be placed there," Mikhailova said.
    "Now in the space of the former cultural centre there's a training camp of -- I don't know how to call these people, I don't want to call anyone terrorists or separatists -- so let's say a training ground for fighters, there is also the local emergency commission and there is a prison, where people are tortured, sentenced to executions etc," she added.
    Mikhailova herself left the city for Kiev, where her Izolyatsia colleagues followed shortly after. Then they found that they can no longer return home.
    One installation featured by Izolyatsia artist Serhij Zakharov features a house of cards depicting participants who proclaimed the Donetsk's People's Republic, as well as Russian President Vladimir Putin.
    "What about the caricatures, they were designed for the construction of the card house of cards. It is an installation that transforms into a performance. The main idea is that when you take out the key card of the joker - this is Putin for us - the whole card house, these artificially created organisations like DNR [Donetsk People's Republic] and LNR [Luhansk People's Republic], is destroyed," Zakharov said.
    "We hung up the cards for the installation showing the leaders of the fighters in the centre of the town. They didn't hang for long, they always took them down. This was some kind of our partisan fight. Unfortunately the internal secret service or whatever you call it found us and they imprisoned me. Or not arrested, but took as a hostage," he added.
    One attendee at the exhibition, journalist Jefim Fistejn was born in Jewish family in then-Soviet Kiev in 1946. After signing the Charter 77, Fistejn was forced to leave Prague for Vienna to live in exile.
    He said after viewing the exhibition that he could relate to the story of Izolyatsia.
    "These are people of different backgrounds who prove, by their own stories, the mendacity of the propaganda which forces us to believe that in the east of Ukraine there is a defence of the Russian minority against a fascist Ukrainian majority. It is simply not true. These living people are telling us the stories about their activities in Donetsk, in Kiev and now abroad, and they prove that what's going on there is not about language or about the interests of Russian minority, but only that more powerful authoritarian neighbour of Ukraine decided they won't let part of Ukraine to move towards the west or provide free art activities, like these young people," he said.
    DOX gallery director Leos Valka said it was the perfect location to welcome the artists.
    "They are our colleagues, the same people as we are, who got into a war situation and who had to escape. They left their town and they are trying to draw attention to their situation from abroad, and it is natural that they are using artistic media and where else than in galleries such as DOX," he said.
    Russia accused the United States on Thursday of coercing Kiev into pressing on with the conflict in east Ukraine.
    The United States has accused Russia of sending arms and soldiers to back pro-Russian separatists fighting government forces in east Ukraine and Western leaders have accused Moscow of building up forces near the border with Ukraine.
    Moscow had repeatedly denied such accusations.
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