We are propagating and signing off on this appeal to international artists’ to push back against Russian aggression and the manufacturing of war in Ukraine.
Appeal to the International Art Community
(from the Assembly for Culture in Ukraine)
On March 1, 2014 the Russian Parliament authorized the use of military force in Ukraine. Russia’s intervention in Ukraine disregards all international norms and, especially, the “Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances” signed on December 5, 1994, when newly independent Ukraine gave up its arsenal of nuclear weapons. Russia, the United States and the United Kingdom pledged to respect Ukraine’s territorial integrity; therefore this appeal is addressed primarily to the art communities of these countries.
When your government does not fulfill the international obligations it has accepted, can you still consider that you live and work in a lawful, civilized and humanitarian state?
Russia’s aggressive actions look like revenge for the Ukrainian people’s insistence on choosing Europe and ousting their dictatorial president, a choice that cost a hundred lives. Today Russia is an aggressor-state where culture is either forced to serve imperial propaganda or persecuted.
We call on you to actively denounce the imperial aggression of V.V. Putin, thus promoting the preservation of Ukraine’s territorial integrity and, accordingly, peace in Europe.
We call for a boycott of cultural events that aim to represent Russia internationally (Manifesta, IV Moscow International Biennale for Young Art, etc.) and to support those cultural workers in Russia who dare to condemn Russia’s aggression against Ukraine.
We not only encourage your free choice of method in impacting your own national government, but insist on applying uncompromising pressure on the government of the state-aggressor. We also ask you to inform your country’s leadership and population – using all available means – about what has happened and is still happening in Ukraine. In this, we promise to offer whatever assistance we can.