Russia's 'Alas Parade'
Members of the Russian performance-art group {rodina} (motherland) displayed signs with downbeat phrases in a St. Petersburg suburb. They were marking November, "the most joyless and depressing month" of autumn, but they also said the "depressive" performance reflected the "mood of the people" in Russia. https://vk.com/rodina_group?w=wall-65922260_683 Photographs by Vadim Lurie.
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"Born, Put Up With It, Died." The {rodina} performance-art group has existed since 2013.
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"Our Future Is Alcoholism." The group says it focuses on "performative social art and field and experimental research into patriotism, languages, and power institutions."
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"Let's Put Up With It." The event's organizers say the "Alas-Parade" reflects the current apathy of Russian people.
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"Everyone is dead, but some are deader." One member of the {rodina} performance-art group told the publication Sol (Salt) that the group tries to draw parallels with Soviet-era May Day holiday slogans, such as "Peace, Labor, May!"
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"Spit." In Russian the word is commonly used in an idiomatic phrase meaning "I Don't Give a Damn."
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"Our future." The artists held their signs in cemeteries, at railway stations, in parks filled with fallen leaves, and next to trash bins.
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"Death Is the only hope; ALAS; War, unemployment, November; Let's put up with it; Pain, emptiness, patriotism, nothing." For the group, this performance is a way to take the language used by the Russian authorities out of its usual context and into the real world.
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"Everything Will Be Bad And It Will Never End." {Rodina} frequently holds performances devoted to current issues on a regular basis.
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"Alas." The group tries to take a creative approach to issues in Russia such as of law enforcement, education, and relations between individuals and organizations.
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"No."