LGBTQ+ Pussy Riot co-founder Nadya Tolokonnikova’s exhibition POLICE STATE will run at Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art through Nov. 30.
For the activation, Tolokonnikova has converted the Edlis Neeson Theater into a makeshift prison cell. Monitored in constant, all-seeing surveillance, the space is both a prison and a sanctuary.
Tolokonnikova will occupy the cell during the museum’s open hours, sewing garments as she did in prison. She is also engaging in other activities, from typing to eating meals. From 2012 to 2013, Tolokonnikova was imprisoned by the Russian government for trumped-up charges of “hooliganism motivated by religious hatred,” according to a press release.
Lining the interior walls of her cell are reproductions of artworks originally sent to Tolokonnikova by current and formerly incarcerated Russian, Belarusian and U.S. political prisoners—implicating the concerns of the project far beyond Russia. There are also items of art across the theater’s stage.
