Damian Siqueiros imagines, captures and restores the queer of Russia with his project ‘To Russia With Love’. A field of inquiry tabooed for so long, the queer of Russia has not enjoyed a proper chance to be discussed or shown. ‘To Russia With Love’ is a series of provocative compositions imbued with iconic symbolism. It is a meditative journey into the worlds of past and present, the worlds of censorship and merciless repression, which nonetheless produced some of the world’s most dazzling artistic innovators.

The line-up of the characters who inhabit Siqueiros’ imaginary and yet historically significant world is impressive: Piotr Ilich Tchaikovsky and his beloved companion Aleksey Sofronov; Sergei Diaghilev (the founder of Ballets Russes in Paris and arguably the first modern impresario at large) accompanied by his lover and muse Vaslav Nijinsky, a dancer and a choreographer, whose sheer audacity and force continue to live on as formative stimuli for the modern dance stage; and ultimately, two men behind the masks of Joseph Stalin and Vladimir Putin, the stars in their own right, the champions of censorship, repression, and homophobic rage.

Siqueiros explains his inspiration: “If we think in modern terms, Tchaikovsky is probably one of the most successful gay musicians who ever lived. His Nutcracker and The Swan Lake are embedded in our popular culture more than a century after his death. His life is intriguing, mysterious (his death claimed to be either a suicide or a murder) and his sexuality a topic of fascination. One of the things that is so crucial for me, is the effort by the Russian authorities to erase his queerness as if it was a stain on a nation itself. It is an attempt as futile as trying to cover the sun with one finger.”

Indeed, the official Russian state today continues to deny and obliterate its past and present queer heroes. Notably, a recent documentary about Tchaikovsky produced in Russia – with generous state funding – achieves just that: denial and obliteration. Consider statements by the film’s screenwriter, Yuri Arabov: “It is far from a fact that Tchaikovsky was a homosexual. Only philistines think this. What philistines believe should not be shown in films.”

Now consider this letter Tchaikovsky penned to his brother Modeste, who, as we know now, was not so straight himself: “I am now going through a very critical period of my life. I will go into more detail later, but for now I will simply tell you, I have decided to get married. It is unavoidable. I must do it, not just for myself but for you, Modeste, and all those I love. I think that for both of us our dispositions are the greatest and most insuperable obstacle to happiness, and we must fight our natures to the best of our ability. So far as I am concerned, I will do my utmost to get married this year, and if I lack the necessary courage, I will at any rate abandon my habits forever. Surely you realize how painful it is for me to know that people pity and forgive me when in truth I am not guilty of anything. How appalling to think that those who love me are sometimes ashamed of me. In short, I seek marriage or some sort of public involvement with a woman so as to shut the mouths of assorted contemptible creatures whose opinions mean nothing to me, but who are in a position to cause distress to those near to me.”

The historical continuity of ‘To Russia With Love’ series is preserved through a thoughtful and carefully arranged symbolic setting: a backdrop of the Red Square; an Orthodox icon on the wall; an omnipresent trunk, fully packed and ready to follow its owners into exile. A tender touch between the men behind the masks of Joseph Stalin and Vladimir Putin projects both a revelation and a verdict within the context of these compelling symbols: the lifeless masks of cruelty and hate reiterate their only aspiration – possession of the Square so Red that one can hardly tell between the drops of rain or blood on its eternal stones.

Siqueiros’ “photopainting” is a meticulous and complex methodology, which involves thorough research, both textual and visual, painstaking reconstruction, and ultimately the production of an original work of art that challenges its own references. “Photopainting” is a technique inspired by the postmodern practice of appropriation or post-production, and as such, it facilitates the reading of the work trough iconographic interpretation. In Siqueiros’ own words: “Allegory is a great tool to cite and to deconstruct. It allows me to represent what is not visible and to add an historical perspective to the images. This technique helps me to compare and understand different discourses within the many queer histories which exist.”

Of special note is the artist’s inspiration and masterful visual quotations from the tradition of the Russian Romanticism. Russian Romantics proposed the understanding of the world through the prism of emotion, be it love, joy, fear, or hate. Fear and hate continue to define the disastrous situation for the queer community in Russia today. Siqueiros’ ‘To Russia With Love’ reconstructs and reinforces desperately needed, yet viciously suppressed, values of love and freedom.

The artist’s educated imagination lands him and us in Russia as it is today, a police war mongering state that nonetheless enjoys impunity from the free speaking world. The bloody marriage of authority and patriotic mania is skillfully unraveled through intimate embrace between two women: a police officer and a Sochi Olympian– the true new Russian symbols, who nonetheless find themselves imprisoned by the never-ending past.

Denial and obliteration have always been a weapon of choice for stagnant inhumane autocracies. ‘To Russia With Love’ exposes and educates, transmits and transforms, constructs and reconstructs key queer heroes of Russian history through an astute and visually captivating mise en scène. If knowledge is power, then the acknowledgment of Russia’s queer history may bring about a change in people’s minds, their minds remaining a primary target where power always aims.