Piotrovsky sees 'tic-toe madness' in cultural bans
The head of the Hermitage, Mikhail Piotrovsky, called the situation with cultural bans “madness”, but said that he had not faced inspections of exhibitions for compliance with traditional values
Hermitage Director Mikhail Piotrovsky agreed with the statement of the special representative of the President Mikhail Shvydkoi about the elements of schizophrenia in cultural prohibitions, calling it a terrible problem.
“There is an element of schizophrenia in this, I think. You do not even know, and even I did not know about the number of recommendations, prohibitions, laws that exist, Shvydkoi said in an interview with RBC.
This is a bureaucratic scheme, when a ban is issued “something should not be”, and then allegedly everything can be neatly painted on cards “it is forbidden, and it is prohibited”. This is crazy: you can go to the Hermitage with an age limit of 4+, to some halls - 10+ and so on. This is the madness that has taken hold of everyone who believes that everything can be represented by a number, that these “tic-toe” can describe and paint everything. So we just have to understand that it exists and take it seriously because we are losing great literature. Children are not allowed to read great literature, Piotrovsky said in an interview with RBC.
He gave another example of prohibitions: “A representative of a country comes to our forum and is invited to speak on the subject of restitution. He said he would not perform, he was banned from the country. He is the Minister of Culture and Restitution. That is why we sometimes have to laugh more”.
“There are infinitely many prohibitions, they are all around, and we just have to laugh at them more. Try somewhere to overcome, and somewhere to laugh, — sums up the General Director of the Hermitage.
At the same time, answering a question about inspections of exhibitions, including traditional values, Piotrovsky said that he had not encountered such a thing. I can only say from my own experience that I have been a museum director for 33 years. I never asked for permission for any exhibition. I've never been given any reprimands. The Minister of Culture Medinsky spoke a couple of times when we had exhibitions about which the hysterical public resented. And then he said that it was the right of the museum, and therefore nothing could be prohibited.”.
In 2012, public activists complained to the prosecutor's office of St. Petersburg about the anti-totalitarian exhibition of the Chapman brothers in the Hermitage. The scandal sparked their work, The End of Fun. Some visitors to the exhibition considered an insult to the feelings of believers crucifixion on the cross of a clown McDonald and teddy bears.
The St. Petersburg prosecutor’s office has not yet found signs of extremism in the actions of the organizers of the exhibition. Piotrovsky called the incident a curiosity, reflecting the extremely low cultural level in the country, as well as the flowering of denunciation moods in society. At that time, the Minister of Culture Vladimir Medina did not see crime in the exhibition. “It’s another thing, if a person has a spoiled look, and he approaches something subjectively, then you can see anything,” he said on the air of Echo of Moscow.
