(Prints size 112x80 cm)
Today was probably the last rally for Ukrainian Kherson. The Rosgvardia, which arrived in the city a day earlier, dispersed the protesters with stun grenades and gunfire. There are wounded. Gatherings are banned, and people continue to disappear. Officials in the villages are increasingly being taken away in an unknown direction. Most likely, for "polite" conversations about the prospects of the creation of the “Kherson People's Republic”. Ukrainian humanitarian aid is not allowed through. In Chernobayivka, in addition to Russian soldiers, 3 million chickens are dying of starvation at one of Europe's largest poultry farms. There is tension in the air. Most of us understand that the relative silence that has lasted for the past few days is the calm before the storm.
I often hear from people in the country of storytellers that they are not interested in events in Ukraine, because they are “apolitical”. And it happens that they simply do not believe us and tell us fairy tales they heard in their official fairy-tale media. Of course, it is much more pleasant to believe that you are involved in the great cause of a great nation than in involvement in the military blackmailing of neighboring countries and the murder of civilians. Not for the first time, millions of people have become zombies, unable to see, hear, think, speak, and empathize. Apoliticality is not the term that can justify cowardice and indifference to barbarism, which is done for your money and under your responsibility. Apoliticality is the impotence to change something in your own country and the reason that someone replaces your goals with their own, destroying your life. Soon the fog will dissipate and you will face reality at full speed, as it already happened once in the 90s of the last century. The more stubbornly you resist, the faster you approach and the denser it becomes. Collision will plunge you for a long time into the most unpleasant feeling - shame. But only if you didn't do what you could.
I often hear from people in the country of storytellers that they are not interested in events in Ukraine, because they are “apolitical”. And it happens that they simply do not believe us and tell us fairy tales they heard in their official fairy-tale media. Of course, it is much more pleasant to believe that you are involved in the great cause of a great nation than in involvement in the military blackmailing of neighboring countries and the murder of civilians. Not for the first time, millions of people have become zombies, unable to see, hear, think, speak, and empathize. Apoliticality is not the term that can justify cowardice and indifference to barbarism, which is done for your money and under your responsibility. Apoliticality is the impotence to change something in your own country and the reason that someone replaces your goals with their own, destroying your life. Soon the fog will dissipate and you will face reality at full speed, as it already happened once in the 90s of the last century. The more stubbornly you resist, the faster you approach and the denser it becomes. Collision will plunge you for a long time into the most unpleasant feeling - shame. But only if you didn't do what you could.
“The Captured House” exhibition at Alte Münze, Berlin, Germany