Inside Pussy Riot
Saatchi Gallery, Duke of York’s HQ, King’s Road, London SW3 4RY
Tuesday 14th November – Sunday 24th December 2017
Tickets On Sale: Wednesday 27th September 2017, 10am
From Les Enfants Terribles theatre company, the creators of Olivier nominated immersive smash hit Alice’s Adventures Underground, comes Inside Pussy Riot – a story that needs to be experienced to be understood.
Coinciding with the Saatchi Gallery’s Art Riot: Post Soviet Actionism exhibition and presented in association with The Tsukanov Family Foundation, Inside Pussy Riot is an immersive experience, about Nadya Tolokonnikova‘s tribulations as the founder of Pussy Riot, the post punk, feminist art collective who stuck two fingers up at the Russian system and suffered the consequences.
To mark the 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution, audiences are encouraged to pull on the balaclava and stand up for what they believe in. Stand in the dock as Pussy Riot and live the realities of incarceration through this exhilarating theatre experience. Would you sacrifice everything for the sake of a punk prayer for a freer world?
The immersive world of Inside Pussy Riot seeks to remind audiences what actually happened and how one’s basic human rights and freedom of expression can be taken away at any point.
Nadya Tolokonnikova comments, Inside Pussy Riot shows you what prison, prosecution of political activists and police oppression looks like. It also reminds you what democracy, on the contrary, looks like. And when I say ‘democracy’, I mean real democracy, which is about direct participation of citizens. Inside Pussy Riot plunges you into the totality of an authoritarian system – if you do not choose real democracy and participation, authoritarianism chooses you.
Writer and Artistic Director of Les Enfants Terribles Oliver Lansley comments, We’re so excited to be collaborating with Pussy Riot on this experience. Our plan is to provoke, challenge and make our audiences understand the experience Pussy Riot went through whilst also encouraging them to ask important questions about their own beliefs and what they might do if they found themselves in a similar situation. Freedom of speech is one of the most important contemporary values we have and one we often take for granted.
Co-producer Alexandrina Markvo (Bird&Carrot) comments, The story of Pussy Riot exemplifies the fight for freedom of speech and expression in an authoritarian society. It is a story that needs to be told today. While the setting for the show is Russia, this situation is all too familiar in many countries today. I hope this blisteringly political production will also serve as a powerful reminder to citizens of democratic countries to cherish and defend their freedoms. I am very excited as a producer to bring this immersive performance to the London audience in one of Europe’s leading art spaces- Saatchi Gallery.
On 17th August 2012, Pussy Riot’s Tolokonnikova was prosecuted for performing 35 seconds of a song called Virgin Mary Put Putin Away – a direct attack on the Russian Orthodox Church’s unequivocal support for Vladimir Putin – inside Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Saviour. She was convicted of ‘hooliganism motivated by religious hatred’ and was sentenced to two years of imprisonment, where she was faced with solitary confinement and humiliation, including regular forced gynaecological examinations.
With heightened theatricality, the production exposes the horrors of Pussy Riot’s experience, and shows that what happened to them can happen to anyone.
We are all Pussy Riot.
Title Inside Pussy Riot
Performance Dates Tuesday 14th November – Sunday 24th December 2017
Timed entries from:
11:15am – 4:45pm (Monday and Tuesday)
11:15am – 3:15pm (Wednesday)
11:15am – 8:30pm (Thursday and Friday)
11:15am – 8:30pm (Saturday)
11:15am – 4:30pm (Sunday)
There will be additional evening performances on Wednesday 15th November.
Location Saatchi Gallery, Duke of York’s HQ, King’s Road, London SW3 4RY
Box Office Tickets are available from https://www.seetickets.com/ on Wednesday 27th September, priced from £21.50.
Website http://www.insidepussyriot.com/
How to get there Saatchi Gallery is located just off the King’s Road in Chelsea. The nearest underground station is Sloane Square (on the Circle and District lines). The nearest rail station is Victoria.
Running time 1 hour (approximately)
Twitter @LesEnfantsTerr, @pussyrrriot, @tolokno, #InsidePussyRiot
Notes Ages 14+ at parental discretion, contains nudity
Writer and Artistic Director of Les Enfants Terribles Oliver Lansley
Producers Les Enfants Terribles, Alexandrina Markvo and Nadya Tolokonnikova
Associate Writer Nadya Tolokonnikova
Original idea by Peter Verzilov
Director Christa Harris
Creative Associate Fiona Porritt Designer Zoe Koperski
Assistant Director Florence O’Mahony
Lighting Designer Charlie Morgan-Jones
Sound Designer Alistair Lax
Projection Designer Louise Rhoades-Brown
Les Enfants Terribles
Razor sharp theatre group Les Enfants Terribles (The Daily Telegraph) is one of the most innovative and exciting theatre companies working today. Their work includes award winning, international stage shows such as The Trench and The Terrible Infants, ground-breaking immersive work like Alice’s Adventures Underground and The Game’s Afoot, innovative outdoor touring work such as The Marvellous Imaginary Menagerie and large scale public events for the likes of Save the Children, the British Library and the V&A. The Terrible Infants will be playing at Wilton’s Music Hall from 27th September to 28th October 2017.
Run by Oliver Lansley and James Seager the company is dedicated to creating original, innovative and exciting theatre. Known for their striking visual aesthetic and innovative use of props, puppetry and live music Les Enfants Terribles are constantly pushing themselves to explore new ways of telling stories and immersing themselves and their audiences in the weird and wonderful worlds created by their shows. Les Enfants Terribles’ artistic policy is to make theatre they love and theatre that excites them, and they hope in turn excites their audience. In 2016, Alice’s Adventures Underground was nominated for the Best Family and Entertainment Olivier Award and the following year Les Enfants Terribles were included in The Stage 100 and were nominated for the Innovation Award in The Stage Awards.
Founded in 2001 by Artistic Director Oliver Lansley, Les Enfants Terribles has established a large and loyal following for its unique work, performed all over the world as well as building a large and loyal UK touring audience. In 2012 Les Enfants Terribles formed sister children’s company Les Petits Theatre with a focus on taking well known children’s literature and bringing them to life on stage in creative and exciting ways.
For more information see, www.lesenfantsterribles.co.uk or www.lespetitstheatre.com.
Nadya Tolokonnikova and Pussy Riot
Nadya Tolokonnikova, is a Russian conceptual artist and political activist. She is a founder of the oi-punk anarchist feminist collective Pussy Riot. Nadya has been involved in political activism and illegal street performances since she was 17-years-old. In 2012 Nadya was convicted of “hooliganism” after a performance of punk-prayer “Virgin Mary Put Putin Away” in Moscow Cathedral of Christ the Saviour and sentenced to two years imprisonment. She was sent to a labour camp where she was forced to sew police uniforms. Amnesty International named her a prisoner of conscience due to “the severity of the response of the Russian authorities”. Since Tolokonnikova was released she co-founded an independent news outlet Mediazona on Russian courts, prisons and prosecutions of political activists. Her recent art works include music videos “Straight Outta Vagina”, anti-Trump “Make America Great Again” and “Organs”, a video work on police oppression.
Alexandrina Marvo and Bird&Carrot
London-based company Bird&Carrot, founded in 2014 by Alexandrina Markvo brings the distinctive voices of directors, artists and choreographers to the world’s most respected stages. Bird&Carrot works on a wide spectrum of artistic projects involving not only world-famous performers from across the globe, but also those just starting out on their creative journeys. What the company values above all is the freedom of creative expression. Its foremost objective, therefore, is to create a space for the exchange of artistic ideas and unrestricted discussions.
Among the events Alexandrina Markvo has produced in London are: a unique theatrical performance Brodsky/Baryshnikov at The Apollo Theatre (2017), concerts by Russian rock stars Boris Gebenshchikov (2016), Neschastny Sluchai (2017), Zemfira (2008), classical music concert of Theodor Currentzis and the Musica Aeterna ensemble (2005); and several art exhibitions, including Amanita’s Encyclopaedia (2016). She has also produced contemporary art exhibitions within the programme of the Venice Biennale (Unconditional Love, 2009, AES+F Inverso Munudus, 2014) and Sir Norman Foster’s retrospective exhibition at Pushkin Museum (Moscow, 2006).
Currently Alexandrina is working on an innovative contemporary dance project featuring Royal London Ballet principal dancer Natalia Osipova.
Art Riot: Post-Soviet Actionism presented by Tsukanov Family Foundation
Art Riot: Post-Soviet Actionism is dedicated to Russian protest art over the past 25 years. It will take place in the year of the 100th anniversary of Russia’s October Revolution and although the exhibition will not have any direct links to this historical event, many of the issues that artists face in post-communist Russia are comparable to those in 1917. These include, but are by no means limited to, problems of individual freedom in the face of both political ideology and also religion. The exhibition will feature such performance artists as Oleg Kulik, Pussy Riot, Pyotr Pavlensky, Blue Noses and some others and display various genres and types of protest art from posters and slogans to video art, staged photography and performances. Art Riot runs from 16th November – 31st December 2017. It is open from 10am-6pm, 7 days a week. Admission is free.
The Saatchi Gallery
The Saatchi Gallery was founded in 1985 with the aim of bringing contemporary art to as wide an audience as possible and make it accessible by providing an innovative platform for emerging artists to show their work. Over the last five years the Saatchi Gallery has hosted ten out of the top 15 most visited exhibitions in London, according to The Art Newspaper’s survey of international museum attendance, and also has more followers on social media than any other museum in the world. Entry to all the Saatchi Gallery’s exhibitions is free. www.saatchigallery.com.
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https://twitter.com/pussyrrriot
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