Russia’s violent war in Ukraine has been going on for more than ten months, and Lithuania’s cultural sector is rethinking its relationship with Russian culture, Lithuanian public media LRT writes.
In December, Ukrainian Culture Minister Oleksandr Tkachenko called on Western countries to refrain from promoting and consuming Russian culture. He noted that Russia is actively destroying Ukrainian cultural values, and since the beginning of the Russian invasion, more than 800 cultural objects, monuments, and works of art have disappeared into nothingness.
Lithuanian Minister of Culture Simonas Kairys emphasizes that Tkachenko is not calling for the destruction of books, but a deliberate pause in the consumption of Russian culture.
«He is asking for a simple thing: in a time of war, when Russia is targeting Ukrainian culture, we must give up works that we used to find acceptable,»
the minister said. However, in his opinion, people and institutions should decide for themselves how acceptable Russian culture is for them now, and the state should not become a censor.
The director of the Scanorama film festival, Gražina Arlickaitė, emphasized that the historical context is very important. According to her, it is not sensitive to show Russian films while a Russian-initiated war is taking place nearby. She said that Moscow has been referring to Russian culture as a «great culture» since the time of the USSR, and today the talk of greatness serves the purposes of Russian propaganda.
Meanwhile, the former head of the Lithuanian Opera and Ballet Theater Gintautas Kėvišas pointed out that culture has turned from a soft power tool into a more serious weapon: «Putin has said that Russia will conquer the world with ballet. Just like oil, culture is also Russia’s weapon.»
Representatives of the field of Lithuanian culture believe that the moment when Russian culture is not used should be devoted to getting to know other cultures, including the Lithuanian one.
Read the full article here: https://www.lrt.lt/en/news-in-english/19/1857906/tchaikovsky-is-moscow-s-weapon-too-lithuanian-cultural-sector-calls-for-pause-on-russian-arts
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