MOSCOW (AP) – A feminist artist was prosecuted on Monday in Russia on charges of disseminating pornography after sharing online artwork depicting female bodies. Human rights groups linked his prosecution to the Kremlin’s conservative stance that promotes “traditional family values.”
The charges against activist Yulia Tsvetkova, 27, in the far east of Komsomolsk-on-Amur, have sparked international outrage. He faces up to six years in prison for charges related to his group on the popular Russian social media network VKontakte, where stylized drawings of vaginas were posted. Tsvetkova is not allowed to disclose details of the criminal case against her.
The hearing comes a year and a half after she was first detained and eight months after Russian President Vladimir Putin signed constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage and instructing the government to “preserve traditional family values.”
Tsvetkova’s lawyer, Irina Ruchko, told reporters after the hearing that she maintains her innocence and that the defense intends to prove it in court.
Tsvetkova directed a children’s theater and was a vocal advocate of feminism and LGBT rights. She founded an online group called Vagina Monologues that encouraged fans to combat the stigma and taboos surrounding the female body and published art by other people.
Amnesty International last week called the case, which is being heard behind closed doors, a “Kafkaesque absurdity” and urged Russian authorities to drop all charges. He said Tsvetkova only “expressed her views through art.”
Tsvetkova’s mother, Anna Khodyreva, echoed that sentiment in an interview with The Associated Press.
“Yulia has always been against pornography. … Feminists are against pornography because it is the exploitation of women’s bodies, ”she said.
Tsvetkova was arrested in November 2019 and spent the next four months under house arrest. Her home was raided, along with her mother’s children’s education studio.
The activist was fined twice for violating Russia’s law against spreading gay “propaganda” to minors. The court ordered Tsvetkova to pay a fine of 50,000 rubles ($ 780) in December 2019 for leading an LGBT-themed online group and 75,000 rubles ($ 1,060) in July 2020 for a raffle in favor of LGBT families. The second fine was later reduced to 50,000 rubles.
Many public figures have expressed support, including Russian veteran of state television Vladimir Pozner. Activists from all over Russia have protested his prosecution, artists dedicated performances to him and an online petition calling for the charges to be withdrawn has garnered more than 250,000 signatures.
An exhibition of Tsvetkova’s paintings opened in St. Petersburg on Saturday.
“The snowball of censorship has started to upset the art community a lot and we’ve come to understand that if we don’t defend Yulia, we don’t support her, anyone else can be next,” said artist Alexei Gorbushin, who organized and participated in performances with the support of Tsvetkova, said at the exhibition.
The European Union delegation in Russia tweeted to the bloc “that it is following closely” the case against Tsvetkova and that “apparently, his persecution is related to his public position as an LGBT activist.” The delegation called on the Russian authorities to stop the prosecution.
In addition to pressure from authorities over the past two years, Khodyreva says she and her daughter have received death threats and have been repeatedly harassed by strangers. Khodyreva’s children’s educational studio has lost many clients. Tsvetkova’s children’s theater, Merak, no longer exists; frequent visits by law enforcement were too distressing for the children, so it was closed, Khodyreva said.
“It simply came to our notice then. I’m still looking back at the door, “Khodyreva told the AP. “The police have gotten cheap so many times that … I’m not prepared to have the kids involved in this chaos.”
Tsvetkova’s problems began when children’s theater was preparing to show a play about gender stereotypes, titled “Blues and Roses,” in March 2019 at a theater festival she organized.
The festival lost two places it found, Khodyreva said, and police questioned the children involved in the play about whether Tsvetkova, who directed it, spoke to them about LGBT issues. The play had nothing to do with LGBT issues (the name referred to the colors traditionally associated with boys and girls), but in the 1990s, “blue” and “pink” in Russian were popular colloquialisms. between gay men and women.
According to Khodyreva, police did not speak to the children’s parents, many of whom supported her and her daughter, and contacts with police were traumatic for young theater students.
“We saw how bad the children felt. We saw the boy who came to the name of the play crying thinking it was his fault, ”Khodyreva said, adding that another boy who was worried about telling the police something about his daughter went to cry.
Tsvetkova was repeatedly summoned for questioning. In March 2019, the activist said she was asked about a series of her drawings called “A Woman Is Not a Doll.” Cartoon images of naked or semi-clad women carried captions such as “Real women have body hair, and that’s normal,” “Real women have body fat – and that’s normal.” Police alleged the images were pornographic, Tsvetkova said in a VKontakte post.
Months later, she was arrested and charged with spreading pornography.
The prominent human rights group Memorial of Russia has declared Tsvetkova a political prisoner. The group said her persecution was related to “her civic engagement and her feminist views which she did not hide and promoted through absolutely legal means as a contemporary activist and artist” and the narrative of advocating “values which the Kremlin has adopted in a candidacy. to tighten the power.
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Alexander Permyakov in Komsomolsk-on-Amur and Yekaterina Krylova in St. Petersburg contributed to this report.