Nadya Tolokonnikova is not someone who wavers. Best known as a co-originator of Pussy Riot, she has—subsequent to her liberation from incarceration, where she was sentenced to two years on accusations of “hooliganism” for her involvement in Pussy Riot’s “Punk Prayer” demonstration at a Moscow church—established a nonprofit organization to monitor human-rights violations in Russian prisons; launched an autonomous Russian news outlet, Mediazona, which was later defamed by Vladimir Putin’s government as a “foreign agent”; devised an ongoing apparel and accessories line; penned an inspiring and just autobiography along with an activism guide; attained a pop star status; and wed a visionary in the Web3 realm.
More lately, though, amid ongoing political activities, Tolokonnikova has been focusing on the artistic endeavor that lies at the core of nearly all her undertakings. “Rage,” her inaugural museum exhibition encompassing contemporary visual and performance creations, begins tomorrow at OK Linz, a modern art venue in Linz, Austria. (The exhibition is available until October 20.)
The display, organized by Michaela Seiser and Julia Staudach, unravels over two levels and presents 11 pieces from Tolokonnikova’s Icons series of acrylic lettering on canvas; six pieces from her Dark Matter series, incorporating calligraphy and motifs loosely derived from the orthodox cross; her imprisonment records; a video archive of Pussy Riot demonstrations including “Punk Prayer”; a novel piece featuring recycled sex dolls; a duplicate of her Siberian jail cell; and five art films—including, notably, “Putin’s Ashes,” which premiered last year at Jeffrey Deitch in Los Angeles, was recently acquired for the ongoing collection of the Brooklyn Museum, and is marking its European premiere at OK Linz.
The initial chamber, “Rage Chapel,” showcases works from the Icons series—among them, the triptych My Motherland Loves Me and I Love My Motherland, alluding to both Joseph Beuys’s I Like America and America Likes Me and Oleg Kulik’s I Bite America and America Bites Me—alongside Pussy Riot’s 2014 enactment at the Sochi Olympics, “Putin Will Teach You How to Love the Motherland,” which observed Tolokonnikova and her co-performers being assaulted, whipped, and tossed to the ground by Cossack militia. The subsequent chamber is centered around “Putin’s Ashes,” an installation inspired by a 2022 enactment at an undisclosed site featuring 12 Pussy Riot contributors from Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus incinerating a 10-foot-tall likeness of Vladimir Putin, with the residues later bottled and labeled. Suspending above the staircase leading to the second level is a colossal inscribed knife, Damocles Sword, encircled by three lofty velvet banners, with Tolokonnikova’s calligraphy reiterating an incantation: “Love is stronger than death.” (Another triptych, Love Is Stronger Than Fear, honors Tolokonnikova’s friend and ally Alexey Navalny, who faced fatality in a Russian penal establishment in February.)