UPDATE: According to an interview with ANIMAL, this action was not sanctioned by Voina, but was undertaken by a former member of the group (Pytor Verzilov, pictured below being taken away in handcuffs) who continues to act on Voina’s behalf. What’s more, if what is said in the interview is true, the roaches never actually made it to the courtroom, which is why there is no documentation besides the below pictures of preparations being made. Voina’s current member Oleg Vorotnikov alleges that the idea was stolen from him, and elsewhere in the ANIMAL interview, Voina’s Alexei Plutser-Sarno describes Verzilov as a fraud, a kleptomaniac, and a snitch. The current Voina members are still responsible for the punk concert and penis painting, both described in more detail below.
UPDATE: RebelArt has posted pictures of Voina preparing the action, and is reporting that 3,500 cockroaches were released in the courtroom. One of Voina’s websites has more, including some of the ones below.
The court’s decision in the much-discussed Forbidden Art exhibit was handed down earlier this week, with fines for the defendant curators Yury Samodurov and Andrei Yerofeyev, for inciting religious hatred. The radical artists collective Voina was on hand for the verdict.
In addition to grabbing headlines by painting a giant penis on the St. Petersberg bridge recently, in 2009, Voina disrupted the Taganskiy District court during the hearing of the Forbidden Art case with a one-song punk concert, performing as the punk collective Cock In the Ass. The song they chose was All cops are bastards from the new album PLEN, a Russian acronym for “Fuck the Police Those Motherfucking Bosses.” Watch in the video below.
As judge Svetlana Aleksandrova announced the verdict, stating that “the artwork at ‘Forbidden Art’ is very gross and very offensive for viewers and humiliates their sense of human dignity,” Voina released thousands of cockroaches into the courtroom before being detained.
3,500 roaches hit the courtroom floor
Voina’s Pytor Verzilov being detained (Image credit: Denis Sinyakov / Reuters in The Moscow Times)
The curators have vowed to appeal.
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F*cking great!!!!
True heroes!!
Big smile on my face.
ACAB!!