The Cathedral of Christ the Saviour is a Russian Orthodox cathedral in Moscow, Russia, on the northern bank of the Moskva River, a few hundred metres southwest of the Kremlin. With an overall height of 103 metres (338 ft), it is the third tallest Orthodox Christian church building in the world, after the People's Salvation Cathedral in Bucharest, Romania, and Saints Peter and Paul Cathedral in Saint Petersburg, Russia.
Voina is a Russian street-art group known for their provocative and politically charged works of performance art. The group has had more than sixty members, including former and current students of the Rodchenko Moscow School of Photography, Moscow State University, and University of Tartu. However, the group does not cooperate with state or private institutions, and is not supported by any Russian curators or gallerists.
Fuck for the Heir Puppy Bear! was a political-artistic performance staged by Russian performance group Voina at the Timiryazev State Biological Museum in Moscow in February 2008.
The Voice Project is a 501(c)(3) non-profit advocacy group focused on promoting freedom of artistic expression as an agent of social change. The project was founded in 2009 as a response to the Lord's Resistance Army Insurgency in Northern Uganda, but has since expanded programs into Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Central African Republic, Russia, China, Afghanistan, Cuba, and the United States.
Alek D. Epstein is a Russian-Israeli sociologist of culture and politics. He divides his time between Jerusalem and Moscow, taking part in a number of academic, educational, social change, and civil rights activism projects in both countries. He has published more than 200 manuscripts in various scientific journals and collections and authored more than 20 books on Israel and the Middle East.
Mike Lerner is a film director and producer. He has directed Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer (2013), and Klarsfeld (2022). He has produced multiple documentary films and series including Hell and Back Again (2011), Rafea: Solar Mama (2012), The Square (2013), The Departure (2017), The Great Hack (2019), The Kleptocrats (2018), The Vow (2020–22), The Meaning of Hitler (2020), F*ck this Job (2021), Flight/Risk (2022), and Defiant (2023).
Pussy Riot is a Russian feminist protest and performance art group based in Moscow that became popular for its provocative punk rock music which later turned into a more accessible style. Founded in the fall of 2011 by 22-year-old Nadya Tolokonnikova, it has had a membership of approximately 11 women. The group staged unauthorized, provocative guerrilla gigs in public places. These performances were filmed as music videos and posted on the internet. The group's lyrical themes included feminism, LGBT rights, opposition to Russian President Vladimir Putin and his policies, and Putin's links to the leadership of the Russian Orthodox Church.
Nadezhda Andreyevna "Nadya" Tolokonnikova is a Russian musician, conceptual artist, and political activist. She is a founding member of the feminist group Pussy Riot, and has a history of political activism with the street art group Voina.
Yekaterina Stanislavovna Samutsevich is a Russian political activist. She was a member of the anti-Putinist punk rock group Pussy Riot.
Maria "Masha" Vladimirovna Alyokhina is a Russian political activist. She is a member of the anti-Putinist punk rock group Pussy Riot.
Mark Zakharovich Feygin is a Russia human rights activist and former lawyer who represented Pussy Riot, Nadiya Savchenko and Leonid Razvozzhayev in Russian courts. He also served from January 1994 to December 1995 as a deputy of the State Duma and was the vice mayor of Samara. In 2011 and 2012, Feygin was active in opposition to President Vladimir Putin, and announced that he was forming an opposition party.
Prisons in Russia consist of four types of facilities: pre-trial institutions; educative or juvenile colonies; corrective colonies; and prisons.
Pyotr Yurievich Verzilov is a Russian-Canadian artist and activist who came to prominence as the unofficial spokesperson of the band Pussy Riot when he was arrested and jailed by the Russian state in 2012. Verzilov was married to Pussy Riot member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova.
Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer is a 2013 documentary film by Mike Lerner and Maxim Pozdorovkin. The film follows the court cases on the Russian feminist/anti-Putinist punk-rock protest group Pussy Riot. Directed by Lerner and Pozdorovkin, the film featured publicly available footage of the court proceedings and interviews with the families of the band members, but no interviews with the band members themselves.
PyotrAndreyevich Pavlensky is a Russian contemporary artist. He is known for his controversial political art performances, which he calls "events of Subject-Object Art". His work often involves nudity and self-mutilation. Pavlensky makes the "mechanics of power" visible, forcing authorities to take part in his events by staging them in areas with heavy police surveillance. By doing so, "the criminal case becomes one of the layers of the artwork" and the government is "[drawn] into the process of making art".
Mediazona is a Russian independent media outlet focused on Anti-Putinist opposition that was founded by Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, who are also co-founders of the protest group and band Pussy Riot. The outlet's editor-in-chief is Russian political journalist Sergey Smirnov.
Russian feminist protest art group Pussy Riot has released two studio albums, one mixtape, three extended plays, 21 singles, and 32 music videos. The band, which has an unspecified number of members but most popularly consists of Nadya Tolokonnikova, Maria Alyokhina and Yekaterina Samutsevich, gained international recognition in 2012 when they publicly protested against Vladimir Putin with their song "Punk Prayer: Mother of God Drive Putin Away".
Veronika ‘’Nika’’ Nikulshina is a Russian artist and activist known for being a member of Pussy Riot and being arrested while protesting on the field at the 2018 FIFA World Cup. She acted as a spokesperson for Pyotr Verzilov after his reported poisoning months later. She has been subject to arrest by Russian authorities' numerous times, leading to her fleeing Russia to Georgia.
"Purge the Poison" is a song written and recorded by Welsh singer-songwriter Marina for her fifth studio album, Ancient Dreams in a Modern Land (2021). It was released as the project's second single on 14 April 2021, through Atlantic Records, alongside the album's announcement. The song was produced by Jennifer Decilveo and previously teased by Marina in 2020. It was promoted through the creation of a news alert website called AllMyFriendsAreWitches.com. The song is a guitar-heavy pop, electropop, and power pop anthem, sung from the point-of-view of Mother Nature. Its lyrics preach about a better society, that is free of capitalism, climate change, and patriarchy.
Lucy (Lyusya) Shtein is a Russian activist and member of punk-rock collective Pussy Riot.
