Dann wurde im ersten Panel des heutigen Symposiums bezeugt, wie sich dieses autoritäre Umfeld auf einer ganz individuellen persönlichen Ebene betroffener Künstlerinnen und Künstler auswirken kann. Das lässt dann mit der Frage zurück, was getan werden kann, was getan werden soll. Und dieses heute den Betroffenen bzw. ihren Familien und Vertrauten eine Stimme geben, ist in sich ein solcher erster Schritt. Bevor wir zum zweiten Panel kommen, erlauben Sie mir zwei kurze Anmerkungen. Die erste Anmerkung ist zum heutigen Datum. Am 9. November 1938 hat das Novemberpogrom der Nationalsozialisten gegen Juden und Jüdinnen im gesamten Deutschen Reich inklusive Österreich und auch hier in Wien viele Opfer gefordert. nicht nur für uns von der jüdischen Gemeinde, sondern für ganz Österreich und gerade in Wien sieht man viele Spuren dieses Pogroms. Damals wurde ein Teil der Bevölkerung misshandelt, während der Rest mitmachte oder weg sah. Und das soll nicht unerwähnt bleiben, weil auch heute bei dieser Veranstaltung geht es eigentlich, es geht um Grund- und Freiheitsrechte und es geht um die Achtsamkeit und ein bewusstes, wachsames Hinschauen, ein Nicht-Wegschauen. Und, wie es vorher auch eine der Betroffenen gesagt hat, ein Hinhören. Und erlauben Sie mir eine zweite Bemerkung, nämlich kurz zum Verein Artmof. Die Idee und das Ziel des Vereins stecken sehr anschaulich im Namen, den eine unserer Mitgründerinnen gefunden hat und geprägt hat, nämlich der Ariadne Faden. Ariadne Faden ist in der griechischen Mythologie ein von Daidalos erschaffener Behelf, der es dem Helden Theseus erlaubt, einen Weg aus dem Labyrinth des Minotaurus zu finden. Und so ist es die Idee, irgendwie auch in einer österreichischen Tradition, einer vermittelnden kulturellen Brücke auch dazu einen Beitrag zu leisten. Eben aus dem Labyrinth der komplett zerrütteten Kulturbeziehungen zwischen Russland und dem Westen zu einem besseren Verständnis heraus oder mit Ariadnes Faden zurückzufinden. Aber heute steht im Zentrum die Unterstützung der unabhängigen Kunst und, wie Frau Scherbakova es gesagt hat, der alternativen Kunst. Also jene Kunst, die sich nicht, auch nicht unter anderem einer offiziellen staatlichen Diktion fügt und nicht einfügt. Aber lassen wir jetzt die AktivistInnen zu Wort kommen und ich darf diese jetzt für das zweite Panel auf die Bühne bitten und das Wort an die Journalistin Siobhan Gietz weitergeben. Vielen Dank. Applaus Hello. Thanks for coming. I'm Siobhan. I'm a journalist at the Austrian weekly politics magazine Profil and I'm very honored to moderate this panel. As we've heard before, in the panel before, there was for a long time no freedom of speech and expression in Russia. But since the full-scale invasion in Ukraine, speaking up has become increasingly dangerous for everybody and also for artists. Many are imprisoned, many more in exile. Now, I want to elaborate on this panel, what can be done to help with the panelists, and what to raise awareness, what can we do, what can everyone else here do to raise awareness and to make sure people are not forgotten. I want to introduce very quickly, and then maybe you can tell us more about what you do, Sascha Skoric, a writer, activist, and she has a bookstore in Hernaals in Vienna called Camerun. Very welcome. Lilia Nordic, artist and an activist for anti-war and feminist issues. Welcome. Lydia Otsoskaya, from the association Russians Against War. She actually helps writing letters to prisoners. Welcome. And Pasha Kogan, author, activist, and works for Memorial. The first time he was detained was at age 12 in 2014 protesting the war in Ukraine. Thanks for coming. Maybe we can have a quick round of introductions now and maybe starting with you Sasha, tell us what you do, how long you've been here, talk about yourself a bit. here talk about yourself a bit. Can you hear me? Okay. So it's not easy for me to talk about what is happening in Russia actually because I haven't been living there for already ten years. I've been living in Vienna since 2015 and I left Russia in 2014. Before I left I was actively involved in all kinds of activism in Russia, in St. Petersburg, mostly for the seven, eight years before my leaving, it was mostly queer and LGBT activism. And I left because of this first, the so-called anti-gay propaganda law, which was established in 2013. But it all started earlier in 2012, when the foreign ancient law was established in Russia, and queer and LGBT organizations were among the first who were prosecuted, and whose activities was not more possible and with this anti-gay propaganda law first among children it was called the prosecution came to the personal level and activists were prosecuted personally and their families were at risk and that was the time when first people started to leave and after that more and more people are leaving every year and what i'm trying to do here in Vienna is helping and supporting the Russian-speaking community not only the people who were involved in activism but also the asylum seekers, the migrant people not only from Russia but from all over people who speak Russian, who know Russian. We have a bookstore together with my partner and colleague, who is also here. And it is not only a bookstore, it's a non-commercial organisation and a meeting point for people where they can get support. Because I remember when I first came here, it took me several years just to... It was just years fighting for existence, nothing more. I could not do anything else. And I can imagine how hard it is for the people who came. And what we are doing here, we are creating this community net, so people could share their resources, people who live here more, people who just came. The resources are limited, but it is possible to share and stay solid with those who had to leave, although they did not choose to do so. had to leave, although they did not choose to do so. Hi, everyone. Thank you for coming and staying. It's late and it's Saturday. You probably have a lot of fun things to do, not listening about torture and repressions. But we are really honored that you are all here. And I'm in Vienna for almost two years. I had to flee Russia in March 2022 after I was a suspect of a criminal case. I was accused in terrorism and I was arrested for two days and after I was released I was evacuated from Russia. First I went to Estonia, and then I decided to become a student in Austria. And my goal was not to become a student in the first place, but to get a student's visa, not to apply for asylum. So I am also one of the co-founders of Feminist Anti-Resistance Movement. It's a grassroots feminist movement that was founded on the second day after a full-scale invasion in Ukraine. And it united different feminist groups and activists from different regions of Russia to unite our feminists' abilities to organize against full scale invasion in Ukraine. And I'm still coordinating this movement from exile. Half of our team is still in Russia, and they're working underground anonymously, sustaining this movement and doing kind of partisan resistance in Russia. And part of our team is in exile in many different countries. But every day we're working closely together. So I'm studying now at Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, Bildenden Kunst. Sorry, my German is still zero level. And yeah, I'm studying contemporary arts, because I was an artist before I had to flee. So it was a logical thing to do to continue studying here. And my big part of the work in exile is to build allyships and connections with local activists, European anti-authoritarian activists, feminist activists, anti-militarist activists, anti-fascist activists, which is very actual topic in Austria. And yeah, because we, and I think we will talk about this more today, because we are not talking about Russia in vacuum tonight. We have to consider how right-wing powers, how conservative, traditionalist political powers are very well connected internationally. So, thank you. Hello everyone, my name is Lydia and I can't talk spontaneously so awesome as to people here so I prepared my speech and I will speak on behalf of the volunteer organization Russians against war Vienna opposing the war in Ukraine and the repression in Russia. The main areas of our work involve helping all who have been affected by war and repression, raising donations for Russian anti-war organizations and supporting Ukrainian refugees. In addition to writing letters, as I have already been told, to political prisoners, we are also hosting street protests and raising donations and also organizing cultural events to help reach out to more anti-war minded Russian people and also foreigners, Austrians. In these 2 and 1 half years, because war started two and a half years and in the same time we started our community, we have raised more than 10,000 euros to give it to a charity to political prisoners and Ukrainian refugees. One of main activities is still writing letters to political prisoners which i would like to tell you more about today since september 2022 we have been writing letters every month and we often do it after demonstrations or street protests to involve more people to support political prisoners, because more people are coming to demonstration and then going to write letters. And we dedicate our actions and demonstrations to those who are suffering from war and repressions. We support Ukraine and political prisoners in Russia and since 2022 we have organized 15 street protests in Vienna. An example of our actions would be a demonstration in support of political prisoners and it was the same day, it was anniversary of Alexei Navalny's arrest, still arrest, he was still alive. We gathered in Vienna's main square with a banner with the words you crucify freedom but the human soil knows no feathers. We were inspired by artists Yuri Rybakov and Olga Volkova, who left the same writing on one of the bastions on the Peter and Paul fortress. And this persecution was handled, among others, by Putin, who just had started his career in KGB. We often use our announcements of later evenings not only to promote an event, but also to inform an audience about some political prisoners that they maybe not know about. For example, our announcements have furthered artists and photojournalists Lyudmila Razumova, poet Artem Komardin and Yegor Shtovba, artist Sasha Skoclenka, and many, many others. And these names you probably already know, but we also talk about people who you maybe not know about. In writing these letters, we try to focus on building friendship and trust in relationship with political prisoners, communicating and supporting each other. Sometimes it's not only us supporting them, but also them supporting us. We don't have a fixed list of political prisoners to write to. Instead, we provide tools for finding addresses, such as a Telegram board, memorial, over the info. They provide databases on political prisoners in Russia. And we always inform participants about what to write about, what to avoid for the safety of both sides. We help them find inspiration, such as topics for their first letter. We offer tips on overcoming the barriers on the blank page. On January 28, 2023, I attended letters for political prisoners for the first time. I didn't know who to write to, but the organizers told me that I could use this telegram bot that automatically suggested people to write to. Egor Shtovba, the figure in the Mayakovsky case, the same as Artem Komardin, came up for me. What caught my eye was that Egor was only 22 years old at that time. I was shocked. He is three years younger than me, and he's a for reading poems on the square. How is it possible? And I wrote to Igor this evening. My first letter was just half of a four page, and his reply was the same length now our letters are over 10 pages long we share important news about our lives we share world events tell each other about our experiences make jokes and teach other poems this experience inspired me to help others to write letters and support political prisoners. I have been organizing letters in Russians against war for almost a year now. And in two months, it will be two years since we have been in touch with Yegor. As an example, I would like to read a piece from my personal letters with him. And this will be a part of your Gores letter he is a poet he's writing a little bit difficult so this English the translation will be a little bit complicated sometimes it is apart from the letter so it will be a bit out of the context, but you will understand. So please wait on me, what's on your mind, and share your doubt about whether you did the right thing. It's never too late to rethink something, to start over, to give up, to run away, to stop listening to the voices in your head, to back out of the previous deals with your conscious, or to rethink your conscious. But you don't have to be happy to live a life either. Either way, you have at least one Egor in your list of friends. So tell what you are ready to tell. I hope you have dealt with at least some of your doubts. And it's not so hard and hateful what your correct decisions have led you to. I learned not to take too hard the conversations of my cellmates with views on politics that were alien to me. Sometimes, of course, it makes me angry, but I don't alien to me. Sometimes of course it makes me angry but I don't like to argue and I try to accept them as such. Thank you for your support and for absolving me for my sins. It means a lot for me. It's very supportive and helpful. You seem to accept me for whoever I am and that gives me permission to be myself in a way that I can't accept myself. Thank you. I'll accept you for whoever you so much. I'm happy to find myself in such a company and I'm very grateful to Simone and to Organise the Belvedere for this event to even be happening because for the last years I've been actually sort of travelling Europe organising such events, organising protest actions and as a member, as a worker of Memorial Policies of Prisoners and other memorial parts, I think it's very important to mention that we are fighting, we are trying every day to help political prisoners better and better and we have a fundraiser that is on right now to help over 15 political business. We're collecting over 20,000 euros and it never stops of course because our colleagues from Overdane 4, from Solidarity Zone are fundraising all the time and it's I think of utmost importance for us today to speak of those ways in which we can support political business and the context in which we exist thank you so much for mentioning that because the right-wing parties the uh right-wing notions i think and the very global context and the war with ukraine the criminal war against Ukraine, is what's shifting the current landscape in the whole field of Russian human rights, defending and political prisoners themselves, of course. So I hope we touch upon that. Thank you. My first question, let's stay at the actual topic of helping and supporting. You say financial support, as we've heard from the last panel, that it's about basic, most basic of needs, food and things like that. So what can people, if anyone here in the audience is thinking, I want to help, what is the concrete steps they can take? How can we actually financially support people? Maybe there's a misconception, but maybe people think it's hard to transfer money. Or what do we actually do? How do we help? Oh, not at all. You can actually just go to our website and donate in euros and dollars and cryptocurrency. But that's not the exact point, of course, because we just see that the problem of not knowing, of not seeing those ways is what we actually have to overcome as well. I'm also managing the English version of Memorial Political Prisoners. We have a news media team and we're covering and trying to reach out to as many new partners across the whole globe as we can. I just this summer spoke on the exhibition opening in Montreal which was very surreal because I was online and the fundraiser there helped quite a lot and just this autumn I think we started in the early September with Sasha, with an event in support of and in Tbilisi, Georgia, where we also were fundraising and reading, actually. I think this is the core part. We have to find ways to promote the artistic side, to showcase the works, to be heard. We just discussed, I think, the idea of a concert to support political prisoners that could be actually happening across the whole globe. Mayakovsky readings can help. And they can happen globally, no matter which time of the year it is. So it's just about organizing those ways. What do you think? So just go to the website which is, maybe you can also see... Of course it's memopzk.org. You can find it there and we also have an English version available now but I think that we can actually send it in a more comfortable manner. I don't have a lot to add, but the point that you made, that it's information, that it's knowing about the problem, the minimum what you could do is just share the information you are going. I know that I'm talking about super simple things, but you can go home and tell your friends, your family, your, I don't know, if you're having a blog on Instagram or wherever, you can tell there about the problem. Probably people who could also tell it to other people, and then we will have a community, people who are ready to help. The other thing that I think is very important, that it's very difficult for people from Russia to get a refugee status in Austria. I'm not sure about the whole Europe, but since I'm working with refugees, I know that a lot of Russian people who are actually in danger in Russia because of the war, because of their position, because they're LGBTQ people or something else, they can't apply for status. They can apply, but they will not get it. And I know this is a politician question. This is not a case of people of the art. But as much we talking about it, people, as much we share this information, as much people know about that and can help this problem get solved. Thank you. So you want to raise awareness. But you also say, I mean, people who are political prisoners, of course, they need food and they need financial support. But what we've already heard in the last panel is some of these people, they don't have anybody. So that's why it's important to write letters. But we've also heard that there's censorship and it can be dangerous. Some of what's inside the letters can actually do them harm. So what exactly do you have to look for? Because I think it says a lot about the regime. What cannot be said? Yeah, Sasha already told a bit about this, and what you should not write about. This is not to talk about things that are forbidden in Russia. So it's better not to talk that Putin is a very bad person, but harder. It's better not to talk about the LGBT queer community, because if later we'll get in arms of other people in the cell and they will read it and person can get in trouble because of this and it's better not to ask about details of the case because sometimes people don't even know that they are not allowed to share the details of the case, because sometimes people don't even know that they are not allowed to share the details of the case. And they are sharing, and it can get much worse for them. You should not be inspired. How to say, so if this person burns the, I don't know, some military service. Yes. If person burned a military center, it's better not to write in the letter, I'm so excited and inspired of you burning this building out, because this is what they're trying to escape, to prove that he or she didn't do it. So try to not talk about the case. And yeah, so try to more talk about things that are more neutral, maybe maybe but it's not working all the time like this we had an experience when we are writing very careful the letter and political prisoner answering with everything but we are telling not to write about and the person is telling about government, the war staff, telling about LGBTQ plus rights, telling about the case. But still, we need to be careful. Picking up on the queer community, Sasha, the queer community has been prosecuted for a long time in Russia. Is there any way people in the West can help that community? Yeah, I think I can answer these questions. But first, I wanted to mention about the situation with the queer artists. That was, I think,, has not been mentioned before. As a queer activist, I was involved in creating the first, and I think still the only one, queer festival in Russia. It was a festival of queer arts and culture that first took place in 2009. And I think this first festival was the only one that was not prosecuted by the government starting from 2010. Every year the festival was banned, the events were closed, the government supported the hooligans who came to destroy the objects, so it was a problem every year and queer artists didn't have the space to show their art. What can be done for the queer people in russia that is as i said before it is difficult for me to say because i have not been living in russia for a long time and i don't think that i have the right to talk about it right now but what from what i know many people have no other choice than to leave, to flee actually. And it is very difficult to get out of Russia. As my colleague has already mentioned, the status of a political refugee is almost impossible to get. Also, quite many people are coming here with their families and children, and if they try to get the status they have to live in camps, and the situation is there, probably many of you know about it. So many people try to get a visa and relocate themselves and their families. And I myself was facing the same problem and I was able to leave only because I had luck and because I had an enormous support from many, many people in Europe and in Austria and it takes many hours of work and a lot of resources to help relocate a person. So if you have any ideas or if you have resources or if you have time please try to get involved. And second when people people actually come, and that also goes for the former political prisoners who are released, their lives are destroyed, their careers are destroyed, their mental and physical health is really bad, and some of them try to start all over outside of Russia, and then they, even if they have luck and get a visa and try to start all over here it is very difficult and if you have a chance to help people with work for example with giving them the spaces and platforms to show their art that would be great because many of the former political prisoners who are already released say that when they were in prisons they were heroes and people talked about that them when they are released they are not interesting anymore and they cannot, yeah, they stay alone with their lives destroyed and with the and it is impossible for them to go on with their artistic careers. So if you have resources to support those people this is what you actually can do living here in Europe. you actually can do living here in Europe. I would like to add some practical things. I'm really glad that we underlined that there's no problem of sending money. The problem that there is not enough money that NGOs like Memorial and other initiatives are receiving, because the problem is to sustain the lives of prisoners because it's not like you donate it once some people are senses sentenced for years and they need monthly income to be able to sustain food and it's not only about food there are certain essential products that people need they also also need some clothes, they also need some medicine, they also need to pay for the lawyers who sometimes have to do enormous trips. For example, imagine if a prisoner was sent to a prison in the far east of Russia and all the lawyers who are specializing on the political cases, they are all probably in Moscow, St. Petersburg or like bigger cities. So we also have to get enough money to be able to finance these lawyers flying back and forth to protect these prisoners, to visit them. Also, right now lawyers are not only the people who are defending the prisoners legally, they are also are the figures of psychological support, because sometimes, and we saw that in many cases of political prisoners, where prison administrations, they refuse, they ban prisoners from seeing their loved ones, their family members, and in these cases, a lawyer is the only person, the only person who is close to you, who you can trust, who you can see while you are in prison. And things like that happened to Ilya Yashin when he was forbidden to see his parents and his close ones. And it happened to Alexei Navalny. Before his death he wasn't able, he was banned from seeing his wife, so his lawyers had to constantly visit him, first of all to check on him that he's still alive, that he is not being tortured, to check in constantly. And I mean, of course we all understand and it was mentioned many times that, you know, Alexei Navalny probably was the person who didn't have problems with financing lawyers and everything. And we have thousands of people who don't have any media coverage. They don't have enough of resources to get these funds. And I was thinking that we were talking about these amounts of money, like 200 euros or 300 euros is enough amount of money to sustain food situation for one prisoner. And I think a good idea is also for each of you can become a patron of a specific person. I think it makes sense to talk about professional solidarity here, because today we are talking about artists mostly, people who are connected with art and I think here most of the people are also connected with the artistic world in some case and I think it makes sense to show this international professional solidarity by becoming in financial patrons for specific people to cover their food expenses to cover their lower expenses there's no problem to select a person and contact any Russian NGO. It's no problem to find a website through us or through any of the person who participated here tonight. We can help you do that. Also, I think it's important that art institutions are, you know, getting involved because I don't think it's a big problem for Belvedere to become a patron of at least one artist, and maybe share a couple of hundreds of euros every month. Don't think it will be a financial strategy for huge institutions. And we have a lot of museums in Austria, a lot of very rich art institutions that can make this kind of a project. It doesn't need to be official It can be you know Anonymous, so we don't lead any unwanted attention to this case, but I don't think it's like there is a practical problem to get prisoners funded by European institutions also maybe having Exhib exhibition like we talked about, Pavel's exhibition in Amsterdam. I think it's a great example of how artist is now in prison, but his original works are shown in Amsterdam. And they're also able to fundraise money for less privileged people who are in prison. So there are many ways, or if you're an artist, you can sell your work and make an auction out of it and send the money to support one of these NGOs. So I think our idea when we were discussing this event with Simon, that we really want not to sit here and talk and you get all shocked by the horrifying stories about Russia, but actually thinking about very practical things and very little things that can be done. And I think the consistency of these actions is the most important thing. Even if you donate like five euros and you subscribe to monthly donation to each of organization, it will be better than to have bigger amount of money, but one time only in a lifetime. So yeah. I have a question about that, actually. People who are here today, they're interested, obviously. But since the full-scale invasion, we've seen a lot of canceling of Russian culture, including modern art. Do you think there's a lack of empathy for Russian artists, political prisoners? And how does that play in? I don't know. When I hear about, sorry, can I say it? This is for everybody. When I hear about the cancellation of Russian art, I see Putin's face in front of me. Because this is some things that Russian propaganda has been saying, that there is Russophobia around the world, that everyone hates Russian, that everybody cancels Russian art, that cancel culture destroys Russia and traditional values. I think a lot of artists were able to do projects outside of Russia. And I saw artists who didn't even have a very strong political stance, who were able to continue their careers abroad. So I don't think it's not that one-sided situation. I think still when we're talking about, as you said, ex-political prisoners or artists who just was evacuated, they have a lack of support, but I don't think that this lack of support comes from cancelling Russian culture or Russophobia. I think it just comes from a lack of attention, lack of knowledge that this help is needed. So yeah, that's what I think. Anyone want to add to that? I'd love to. Yes, I think it's of utmost importance for us to see that us sitting here today to this event actually being voices heard at the same time I think once again we should think of in what ways we can we can showcase the artworks till the end of November the exhibition that we're organizing at Applied Arts University of political prisoners, where Pavel Krisevich's artworks can be seen. And over, I think, 30 other political prisoners, you can just come and see it. It's open. The idea of that exhibition not being just a small one, you know, for several weeks or so, the idea of, as you said brilliantly, putting up the names, donating directly, or actually moving this exhibition into one of the hallways of one of the institutions in Austria for it to be more permanent, as long as we unfortunately have this kind of problem. It's all in our world. And on this note, I actually want to mention conferences that are happening on political prisoners. We organized one in September, organized one here in Vienna in October. It was an international one and a large one. It was, I think, over 20 speakers from all over the world coming here to speak on that problem that is not only Russian. And I also want to mention actually the numbers of people we're speaking of. It's thousands of people only in Russia. It's over 7,000 political prisoners who are colleagues from the Ukrainian Civil Liberty Center with whom we were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize two years ago. They count on the Russian soil. It's over 3,000 people in memorial political prisoners databases and it's obviously very important for us to call the names. And I'd like to, for instance, talk a bit about, let's say, Lyudmila Letyna, who is one year younger than me. She's 21 now. And she was... You can see her artworks at our exhibition. And she was sentenced to nine years in prison for a donation of $10 in Russia to a Ukrainian NGO. I don't want to take all the time, really. But I think that, yes, go on. If coming back to people who are actually coming out of prison, But I think that, yes, go on. Coming back to people who are actually coming out of prison, I mean, I just really can't wrap my head around how does that work? So you come out of prison, and you want to continue working, and you can't leave the country. Is there any way artists can actually work, keep working, without getting imprisoned straight away again? Or how do you sort of balance it out? I don't know who's. Maybe Lidia? You're in touch with people? I don't think this is possible for the artists to continue working and Yulia Tsvitkova, one of the artists who was imprisoned and then released, writes brilliantly about her experience of trying to continue her artistic work both in Russia and abroad. And this is not only because both in Russia and abroad. And this is not only because of political reasons, that you can be imprisoned again, but this is also because there is no system of rehabilitation of political prisoners or prisoners at all. And people need so much when they are released. They need so much support released they need so much support they need so much resources to just to go on living and to overcome this enormous trauma that was that they experienced in prison and julia um she yeah she's writing about that and she's writing that she could choose a different topic for her art, for example, and that could be possible to continue being artists, being an artist and just creating the art, but not touching the issues of politics or feminism or queernessness. But first, this is for many people is not possible because this is the way they are and this is their art and they cannot just change it like this. And second, yeah, physical and mental health is in such a bad condition that this is impossible for them, for many of them to go on without support. I want to add to Sasha and answer your question. In my experience of what political prisoners are saying in art area, what are they going to do when they will get released they are going to leave because even people even you go who was writing two years ago to me that he loves Russia he doesn't want to leave Russia his heart is there he he have ever never been abroad and he would like to travel but not live somewhere else. These people existed in the system for years in the prison and unfortunately I think it breaks them and they can't, they don't want to be there anymore. And there are two ways. You could leave or you can live in Russia, but you need to be quiet. And you are not allowed to be an artist, actually, and show your works and show your opinions and As Sasha tells me this few days about that zone who is always trying to show his His opinion and to tell What he's feeling and this is dangerous and he knows that everybody know that so it's It's just option to leave or option to stay and be very, very quiet. I just wanted to add quickly that in Russia, there are a lot of artists who are not imprisoned, luckily. And they're continuing doing their work. And they're very political. They're against the war. They're against the regime. But in these circumstances, they have to really look up for new and new ways of how to camouflage their art, because it's impossible to make a direct political art right now, but it doesn't mean that there's no political art in Russia. There are people who are risking their lives daily, continuing doing art, camouflaging it, and constantly being aware if they crossed the red line yet or not. And this is also a very difficult reality for those artists. By the way, if there's questions from the audience, maybe you can just raise your hands, and I will try to see you if there is. OK. Is there anything else that we haven't talked about that I've forgotten in my questions that you find extremely of uttermost importance and that you want to say? Because we're running out of time. Yeah, I have some points if I can add i think there's another thing that you can do if you want to support russian political prisoners and people in russia in general it's not as i've said before it's not only about thinking it from the perspective oh there's russia we have to do something about it there's a lot that has to be done in Austria, and fighting your Nazis and right-wingers, and FPO party, and Kikl, who just almost took over the parliament. It's a huge thing that you can do, because there's no FPO without Putin, and in a way, there's no FPO without Putin, and in a way there's no Putin without right wing governments all over Europe. And I mean, there is, I think, like discussing Russia and Austria, there's a huge elephant in the room when we are not talking about this bond between Austria and Russia. And the fact that 90% of gas in Austria was exported from Russia in 2024 this is insane that we are all including me who are living in Austria are paying for Russian gas and this is billions of money and these money are helping Putin to continue the war in Ukraine, to continue torturing and killing civil people in Ukraine and to continue to torture our fellow artists in Russian prisons and killing people in Russian prisons. Without this fossil fuel money there's no Putin's regime. And I'm really and we all are very annoyed when we start talking about, oh, when did that happen? It's so bad in Russia right now, but when did it start? You know, repressions and imprisonments of human rights defenders and artists, they didn't start in 2022. And they didn't start in 2014 either. This fight, this aggression towards liberty, towards freedom, towards human rights, towards queer people, towards women, towards migrants, it all started when Putin came in charge and it was almost, it was already 20 years ago. And Austria and Austrian politicians and Austrian leaders were shaking hands with Putin all these years, being well aware that he is torturing people, that he is killing people, murdering people, people like Boris Nemtsov, people like Anna Politkovskaya, and it's not the first war that Putin has started. So I think you, as I'm sure there are a lot of Austrian citizens here, you as Austrian people, you have to really fight your right wingers. And this is your part in our fight against Putin. I think we should be really aware of that. And I think what is happening now in Austria, this is embarrassing embarrassing considering the election results and considering this huge right-wing turn and we should really organize and we should wake up and do something about it because you know you don't have political prisoners being tortured in your prisons yet but things can escalate really quickly so I think we should be really aware of that. So since I am talking here about letters for political prisoners, I will use this last opportunity. So tomorrow, me and Sasha and Lena, we are organizing one of our monthly evening letters for political prisoners. And you are all invited. So if you are interested in writing a letter, you actually don't worry. You could do it in English or German. Wenn Sie sich für eine Botschaft interessieren, können Sie das in Englisch oder Deutsch machen. Wir übersetzen sie in Russisch und dann übersetzen wir die Antwort für Sie in Deutsch und Englisch. Sie können also Ihre ersten kleinen Schritte in der Unterstützung von politischen Gefühlen machen und ihnen eine Botschaft schreiben. Vielen Dank. first small step in supporting political prisoners and write them a letter. Thank you. Yes, thank you. I would also like to note that there are options for you to send letters online and maybe sooner or faster, easier through Memorial Friends website. You can send them in German or english or whatever and it will be translated for you for free or over there in four uh send letters uh i would ask you if you can think of any kind of project of a book of an exhibition of a show of a film that you can show or think of making there is a lot of materials there is a lot of publishing uh published or artworks being prepared right now and if there is any chance of collaboration please reach out to our colleagues from from the previous session please reach out to us or our colleagues and thank you so much for your support thank Thank you. And come to the exhibition at Angevante and let's think of the continuing. If I may just add, I've never talked, been on a panel with people who are that young. I mean, they're very, very young and I think it's really impressive what you've achieved and what you've been doing. And you're all very brave people and I'm yeah I think questions I think we're going to have the closing statements now mr. Stella the director of the house, Stella Rollick, will have the closing statement. And then maybe we can go outside and have a little debate in a more familiar setting, if there's time for that. Yeah, closing statement. I'm closing just with a huge thank you again to you all and I mean now when you when you read media you always have this number of takeaways what do we take away from this and that discussion five take I mean very spontaneous I have three takeaways now we really know we have addresses, we have options to write letters, to donate money, and to fight the right, the rights in Austria, the right-wing politically, yeah. It's not only, it's more than tendencies. So yeah, okay, thank you again. We're gonna have, as you said, we can continue the conversation in a more intimate and personal frame outside. Now there will be wine and some bread to stay longer. Thank you again and yeah I are and they should not see I'm I'm not very focused because it was really much to take in and and to digest now to process now so two more things one is we haven't said a lot of thank yous but I should not forget, I must not forget, some more people who have been involved not only behind the scenes, also tonight, Thank you, Katharina. And Katharina Keil, who works with Atmof. You've done a lot, a lot too. You've been in our small group of organizers from the very beginning. And then Simon, you can join me if you'll, Katharina. Daniel Wallner, also from the Belvedere team, who is our head of events and has organized this whole evening. Simon, would you want to add someone? And finally, there will be a second part of this conference, this symposium, on Friday, November 22nd. We will have Nadia Torokonykova, you all know her from Pussy Riot, in a conversation with Sl while Nadia was in prison and who we'll meet finally in person for the first time here at Belvedere 21 on the 22nd of November. And also Sasha Skocilenko will be here on stage. Ich habe nur eine ganz kleine, also noch eine kleine Sache, die ist jetzt