Pavlensky's performances are extreme, outrageous, and somewhat concise, perhaps a continuation of the Moscow Actionism of the 1990s. In his unapologetic and unwavering acts of protest, his ardent opposition to the state and unwavering criticism of government institutions has seen him walk a fine line between extremist, artist, and mutineer.
After making a name for himself during the Pussy Riot trial in 2012 by sewing his lips together, he went on to nail his testicles to the cobblestones of Red Square and cut some of his ear off with a particularly long and menacing knife. He has progressed from mutualising his own body to causing damage to public property. He started fires in two buildings: a Bank of France building in Paris in 2017 and the entrance to the FSB security service's offices in 2015 (the KGB's replacement).
Pyotr Pavlensky, a controversial performance artist, first made headlines by nailing his scrotum to the pavement of Moscow's Red Square to decry the political indifference of contemporary Russian society. He next amputated his earlobe to express his opposition to the compulsory psychiatric therapy administered to Russian political dissidents.
The performance art happened when a naked Pavlensky scaled the roof of the Serbsky psychiatric facility in Moscow, sat on the ledge, and then started to cut off his ear with a huge kitchen knife.
A bloodied Pavlensky was retrieved from the roof by police and sent to the hospital following the horrifying act of self-mutilation. Doctors evaluated his wound and checked him for pneumonia symptoms because the performance took place in below-freezing temps. Dmitry Dinze, Pavlensky's attorney, asserted that the artist had been declared free of any illness or wound-related issues - he would soon be allowed to leave the hospital.
On the day of the incident, Pavlensky made a statement that was posted on the Facebook page of his wife, Oksana Shalygina, comparing the separation of his earlobe from his body to the "concrete wall" that separates the sane from the deranged in Russian society. The bureaucrat in a white lab coat "takes out from society those components that hinder him from building a monolithic dictation of a single, necessary standard for everyone," wrote Pavlensky. "Armed with mental diagnoses."
Due to Pavlensky's combative political protests that included self-mutilation, authorities attempted to commit him to a mental institution on multiple occasions. A second request to have Pavlensky investigated was denied by a district court in St. Petersburg. This was prompted by a performance in which Pavlensky and others burned some tires on a St. Petersburg bridge in support of the Euromaidan protests in Kiev, which resulted in the resignation of then-Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. At the time, Pavlensky was accused of antisocial behaviour.
When Pavlensky sewn his lips shut in the summer of 2012 in opposition to the trial of punk music activists Pussy Riot. He was whisked away in an ambulance, where he underwent and successfully completed a psychiatric evaluation. The artist was evaluated by a psychiatrist while receiving treatment at the hospital, and was once more deemed to be sane, according to his lawyer.
EItteshad Hossain | 08:50 PM
Sat, 25 Feb, 2023
London, United Kingdom
Artpendix Press
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