#belarus-free-theatre

#belarus-free-theatre

The film follows Talankin in his job at a school in the poor mining town of Karabash in the Chelyabinsk region, showing how the Russian government indoctrinates students with pro-war messages.

Ilker Catak's Yellow Letters and Emin Alper's Salvation, two politically outspoken films that examine Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan's autocratic regime, shared the top prizes at this year's Berlinale: the Golden Bear for Catak and Silver for Alper. These striking works share a lot more. Both titles are co-produced by Liman, an indie film company from Turkey.

Thousands of artists, academics, curators, journalists, and political figures are calling on leaders of the Venice Biennale to "address the implications" of Russia's participation in an open letter published this week. Authored by the Arts Against Aggression International Movement, the petition comes just days after Biennale organizers confirmed in a news release that Russia will take part in its 61st edition, which opens on May 9 and runs until November 22.

Anyone who spends untold hours surfing the Web for humorous content will eventually find the work of one Vladimir Shmondenko, a prankster who goes by the name Anatoly. He's developed a faithful following, and, as far as I can tell, makes a comfortable living entirely from his TikTok and YouTube videos.

Their gathering still had to be dispersed, but the enthusiasm that Ored Recordings inspires even among enforcers of the law speaks volumes about the power of what Khalilov and his friend and label co-founder Timur Kodzoko call punk ethnography: the recording of religious chants, laments and displacement songs at family gatherings, local festivals, in people's kitchens, to fight against the erasure of Circassian culture.

The Ukrainian-born jewellery artist Aleksandr Dotsenko, who was serving a three-year prison sentence in Russia for allegedly placing anti-war slogans in a supermarket in the Leningrad region, died on 19 February of a heart attack, according to media reports. Dotsenko, who was 65 when he died, was convicted of "public calls for terrorist activities" alongside his wife, the artist Anastasia Dyudyaeva, in July 2024. Dotsenko was sentenced to three years in prison, while Dyudyaeva is serving three-and-a-half years.

It Was Just an Accident centers on a group of former prisoners who kidnap a man they believe was their interrogator and grapple with whether to exact revenge, and Panahi says the film drew directly from his own experience with state violence and repression. Panahi has been repeatedly arrested in Iran, served prison sentences, and was recently sentenced in absentia to an additional year in prison and a two-year travel ban.

Public records of the charges didn't list the content that the streaming services, which include Kinopoisk, Wink, Ivi, Amediteka, 24TV, Digital Television and Beeline TV, are accused of sharing on their platforms, as reported by The Moscow Times. The publication added that reporting from Mediazona noted several of the companies had been previously fined for streaming content that was described by Russian authorities as promoting "non-traditional" relationships and lifestyles.

Moscow resident David Gevondyan, who is 22 years old, was given a fine for his post on European social media site VK. In his appeal, Gevondyan argued that he had not violated the law and that Queen's outfit choices did not constitute 'LGBT Propaganda'. According to Verstka, the court rejected his argument, noting that Gevondyan's page also showed photos of men kissing and men dressed in miniskirts. He was fined an undisclosed amount for all of the images.