Mikhail Piotrovsky: Art is a good litmus test

An exhibition of African masks has opened in the Manege of the Small Hermitage.

The word “masks” is much used today. Exhibitions in the Hermitage are often both provocative and an occasion for serious discussion. This time the theme is serious above all because masks are ritual objects. They exist in various cultures, especially in Africa. A mask can conceal the face completely or just the eyes. Now masks cover the mouth – that’s a dress code that will last for a long time. A mask forces you to look into a person’s eyes. The eyes are more honest than the mouth, which is capable of a false smile. As a rule, they do not lie.

African masks are used in various rituals. Venetian ones are associated with carnival. Today no-one recalls that they are also a remembrance of the dead. People believed that the plague doctor’s long mask gave protection from germs.

Masks under our present conditions are a ritual and a language of human culture. By putting one on, you accept a set of terms. People need to remember that and not go shouting, “I am a free individual! I won’t wear a mask!” The mask can discipline us. In the Hermitage visitors go around in masks, protecting themselves and others. The mask restrains outbursts, just like clothing. People who come to the museum in shorts behave differently from decently dressed visitors. Their types of interaction are different.

There are several problems with African masks. Africanists are not fond of the topic of the relationship between African art and the new modern art of Picasso, Matisse… Modern artists were attracted by the fractured lines of ugly shapes in African art and not by its essence, which is remote and deep. The exhibition counters the theme of this art’s influence on the European variety. It tells about African art as a historical and cultural phenomenon, about a mechanism for humans to communicate with other worlds. Those might be other worlds in a science fiction sense, otherworldly places or ritual role play. So far we are only just touching upon this part of the world’s artistic culture.

The exhibition is a challenge to the tendency for restitution. As part of today’s political correctness, European leaders are proposing to return to Africa everything that they took away. The Hermitage is collecting African art.

The exhibition has items from the Hermitage and the Kunstkamera, a place that might serve as a model for the presentation of various concepts of the world. The Hermitage is constantly seeking to explain that differences can get along with each other.

A group of private collectors demonstrates in the exhibition the process of collecting African masks. It has its complexities. Masks are made for sale to tourists; there is a modern souvenir industry. You have to have an understanding of what goes into a collection. A mask is a special symbol of the complexity and diversity of the world.

I have repeatedly stated that we live in conditions of a culture of distrust. The presumption of innocence is gone. It’s lacking among ordinary citizens, institutions, journalists… That is what now determines relations between people.

Everywhere a fight is being waged against corruption. On the one hand, the opposition is exposing people’s corruption, on the other hand, the state is doing it. A favourite method of political struggle, based on absolute distrust. There are not simply examinations of financial activities but examinations for a corruption component. All sorts of dissatisfactions are reduced to the word “corruption”. A typical manifestation of the culture of distrust is the refusal to be vaccinated against the coronavirus. People do not believe anyone.

Distrust crosses over into magic: from suspicions of microchipping to a belief that “the fire will pass and we’ll be spared”. An indicator of the level of culture, knowledge and faith in science. Many have fallen for a large number of non-scientific, quasi-scientific and fantastic theories. For example, people believe considerably more in the Girdle of the Virgin Mary than in the Eucharist. Scientific discussions often degenerate into political ones. People accept attractive rumours on trust.

They do not believe in science because they know little about it. I am not referring just to the exact sciences. In the museum sphere, we discover that people’s knowledge about culture and art are minimal. That is evident from their reaction to modern art and naked sculptures…

A low level of education and the culture of distrust go together. Many different vaccines is a good thing. We should be pleased about it. Yet people are irritated by variety, which leads to intolerance that spills over into distrust and unprotectedness in the face of the pandemic.

The museum attempts to show the beauty of diversity through exhibitions, discussions and presentations. It’s a field with plenty of room for research and discussion. We pin our hopes on the latest technologies. They help people to understand better what’s an illusion, where the truth lies, what large numbers are… There is a line of development in people’s attitude to art. Initially art was considered to be what an artist created. In the 20th century, the artist’s idea was already being mass-produced and sold. Today you can buy a virtual picture for an enormous amount of money and obtain the right of ownership to it. And possession is becoming the most important thing.

Everyone knows what sociological surveys are. They are based on questions and answers. We get responses to the Hermitage’s work online. Those are the reactions of people who have not been asked about anything. They write in themselves. It’s possible to observe which paintings get approached most often. Such contact allows us to understand not only what visitors want, but also what they are like. They results are varied. There is a remarkable stratum of visitors who do not need anything explaining to them: they understand it all. There is, however, a considerable number of people who, while having only a little understanding, imagine that they know it all. That is a calamity. Ignorant people are capable of scandals, shouts and protests. As a result, we are constantly having to deal with complaints. That does not only happen here, but around the world. In America it has developed into a denial of the past, a demand for absolute political correctness in all things. English queens are being played by Black actresses.

It is useful to study society’s reaction to art. It is plainly not the one that emerges from surveys. People’s biases are evident, and it is clear what they are. That is important not for the purpose of forcing them to gain an understanding of, say, Chinese, contemporary or religious art, but in order to grasp who we are dealing with. Art is a good litmus test.

We need a culture of discussions that is disappearing somewhere. There are many stimuli and happenings that ought to be talked about, be it the Okhta headland, obscene language or mass events.

Part of the wonderful Scarlet Sails celebration [put on each year in Saint Petersburg for school-leavers] takes place on Palace Square. As a result the access routes to the museum are closed from the middle of the day. It is like being on the border, and we have to negotiate so that ticket-holders are able to get to the Hermitage. There are also problems with football matches being broadcast on Palace Square. Some find that acceptable, others do not, but we live in the one world, so we should come to some agreement, reach a mutual understanding.

We have, however, a system of smears and denunciations that has replaced an active form of discussion. If someone dislikes something, they write a complaint to the public prosecutor, or to some foreign publication, or you get what calls itself a journalistic investigation. When politics becomes more intense, denunciations start to rain down on major cultural institutions, as well as elsewhere. That increases irritation and the understanding that situations are not all alike is lost.

Institutions connected with foreign funding are closing, The political situation in the country is, perhaps, such that certain foreign influences do need to be restricted. When it comes to some sort of institution, though, it is worth examining how foreign funding has been used there. I remind readers that after perestroika without foreign funding our country might not have survived. It was necessary so as to build ourselves and to live without foreign support. Now it is easy, but that funding helped cultural institutions to survive and develop. We ought to examine each instance and not seek to shut everything down. Logic is needed so as to understand how to act to our own benefit and not “shoot ourselves in the foot” – or to use a popular expression of recent years “bomb Voronezh”.

The medicine is cultural memory. In this respect our city is unique. No other city in the world has such a cultural memory. It is founded on the act of creation – building a city, a navy. In contrast to Moscow, there have been few bloody battles here. Only the Decembrist Uprising and the siege, from which the city emerged with honour. The tsars who ruled here had their names blackened in their lifetimes and after, but each of them had a role in history and in the formation of the image of Saint Petersburg.

The names of artists, writers and intellectuals are of significance here. In other cities that is not the case. Saint Petersburg is Blok, Akhmatova, Brodsky, Likhachev, Granin… Their names are bound up with the cultural memory of Saint Petersburg. We need to take our bearings from that, so as not to slide into mutual hatred, reproaches and complaints that undermine the city’s sense of its own worth.