Join Albuquerque Journal staff writer and host of Work In Progress_ Logan Beitmen as he chats with Artist NADYA TOLOKONNIKOVA (PUSSY RIOT).
Nadya Tolokonnikova is the creator of the Russian feminist protest art collective Pussy Riot. In 2012, she was arrested for her anti-Putin performance "Punk Prayer" and sentenced to a two-year prison term.
On June 5, 2025, Tolokonnikova began a durational performance, titled "Police State," at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, which involved living and making art inside of a simulated prison cell. The performance was interrupted by what Artnews called "an actual police state unfolding outside" -- the thousands of National Guard and Marine troops ordered to downtown Los Angeles by President Donald Trump against the wishes of state and local officials. The artist spoke to Logan on June 12, shortly after the museum announced it would postpone her performance "due to evolving conditions... and military activity." They discussed the power of art and the high stakes of dissent in an increasingly authoritarian world.
Nadya Tolokonnikova's exhibition "I Wasn't Invited So I Broke the Door" opens at Turner Carroll Gallery in Santa Fe on June 28 and runs through July 16.
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