ADVISORY: This post expresses political opinions that are not necessarily shared or endorsed by 35mmc or its content moderators, or for that matter, Pussy Riot, who are more than capable of expressing their own opinions. When I entitled this piece “Live from the Police State”, I was referring to Nadya Tolokonnikova’s museum show and accompanying book. Sadly and shockingly, coming in the wake of the horrific events in Minneapolis this week, the title feels uncomfortably accurate here in the USA. Also I would note that these are ‘fan photos’ from the audience as opposed to a proper concert photo shoot. They were made with a point and shoot, albeit a pretty nice one, and I am presenting for their content and meaning to me when I took them, as opposed to their technical quality — see my notes on the photography at the end of the post. But they have a bit of a punk ‘fanzine’ feel that I think suits the artist and the occasion, perhaps even better than something more conventionally perfect.
Going to see Pussy Riot live was an impulse decision. I’ve admired them for years for their personal bravery in publicly defying Vladimir Putin and facing prison & exile from their native Russia as a result. But I knew very little about their music other than checking out the video for their anti-Trump song, ‘Make America Great Again’ a few years ago. But the ad for their show at Brooklyn Powerhouse Arts kept popping up on my social media feed, so I guess the algorithm decided that Pussy Riot was a better bet for me than… Kid Rock? Based on the show, maybe there’s some hope for the algorithm after all, it was great!
Things kicked off with a blistering opening act, Mother Moor, an artist reciting dark incantations against a bed of free jazz. It was strong stuff, both musically and lyrically and there was a solo dancer who performed to the music at various locations throughout the ‘auditorium’ — a converted industrial space. The first section of Pussy Riot was something of a sonic art/noise/sound collage that is likely an outgrowth/reference to Nadya Tolokonnikova’s fine art museum project, POLICE STATE, where she recreates the conditions of the Siberian prison where she spent two years after being arrested for the band’s ‘Punk Prayer’ protest at Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior.
Nadya spent most of that part of the show stood behind a table operating electronic devices, and wore the same costume she wears in the POLICE STATE museum shows. The sound was deep, dark, and downbeat probably reflecting the heavy mood of incarceration, with other sounds drifting through the mix that I’m guessing are Russian spoken word tapes and music that might be the kind she heard on prison radios. For me, musically it resonated a little with ‘R.A.F.’ a sound collage that mixes audio recordings of the radical German Red Army Faction over a bed of arthouse rock, a 1978 collaboration between Snatch (Judy Nylon and Patti Paladin — the name of their band might resonate even more than the sonic landscape) and Brian Eno.
In any event, while I couldn’t understand a word of that section of the Pussy Riot show, I liked it very much!
After a brief break for a costume change, the band kicked into a set of bright pop punk songs with the rhythm section sporting their trademark balaklava ski masks, and Nadya in a crisp white shirt and rather elegant Adidas leather trousers. The crowd at the show (including me) felt generationally closer to people who were listening to the Sex Pistols and the Clash in their heyday, and there was some ebb and flow in the audience so that slowly but surely I managed to move right up to the edge of the stage.
Not knowing Pussy Riot’s music ahead of time, I was expecting a little more of a ‘classic’ punk sound, all angry energy, and instead was greeted with ironically happy sounding pop, but with dark rebellious lyrics.
Increasingly, Pussy Riot’s music and protests are aimed at an American audience. In April they staged an event in Washington Square Park screaming “Wake Up America”.
One part of me fears that Nadya Tolokonnikova is a modern day Cassandra warning an audience that is a bit too numb to be bothered about a dark future version of America that she knows first hand from her experiences of an authoritarian police state. But another part of me remains hopeful that more and more people in America — and I hope Russia — are indeed waking up to the realization that it’s up to us to protect, or regain, our freedoms.
It seems like Pussy Riot isn’t going entirely unnoticed in their native Russia. The day before the show, the Russian government announced that they are taking steps to designate Pussy Riot as an extremist group which will make it more dangerous for them and their supporters than it already is, especially for those who are living in Russia. Undaunted, they went on with the show and continue to challenge repressive authoritarians in Russia, the US and the rest of the world with their fearless non-violent resistance.
This final image, a portrait of Nadya with her latest book, POLICE STATE, might be a contender for my photo of the year for 2025 if I hadn’t already posted one.
I hope these photos help carry Pussy Riot’s heroic message of defiance and hope.
Notes on the photographs: I wasn’t sure whether the venue would allow me to take photos during the show, but on the chance I could I slipped my compact Contax T2 into a side pocket. Somehow, it seemed fitting to bring some recently acquired Ukrainian film, Derev Pan 400 and Svema Foto 400, that I picked up from the Film Photography Project based on a recent 35mmc post. I had no idea what I was getting into either musically or photographically, but I was excited to try to take some photos of world class Russian punk protest musicians!
Once I saw how many people were photographing the show with their iPhones, I saw no reason I couldn’t grab a few stills with the Contax. The room was pretty dark, and I was pushing the film to 1600, and relying on the Contax’s internal light meter. I disabled the flash out of respect for the band and my fellow audience members and hoped and prayed I’d get something decent in the available light.
Shooting a live performance on an automatic point and shoot was not as straightforward as just pointing and shooting and I was constantly second guessing the camera’s internal light meter and adjusting exposure up or down as the performers roved the stage. I was particularly bedeviled by a very bright naked light bulb on the table where the mixing gear was stationed that I knew what throwing the light meter off and would have left most of the photos very silhouetted or under-exposed. I also tried dialing in some slower frame rates to see if I could get any interesting motion blur — I think the featured image is the most interesting/successful of that type.
Nadya’s skin is quite pale and for many/most shots I didn’t really get much detail in the skin tones of her face. I’m not sure how much of that is down to me overcompensating on the exposure versus the inherent qualities of those film stocks, which I had never shot before. Adding to the general punkiness of these images, there is a wide band down the middle of the roll of Derev Pan that looks like something scraped either the base or the emulsion at some point in the process.
But I do like the energy of the performance that is captured here, and have become a full fledged fan and follower of Pussy Riot through this experience. I hope you enjoy the photos, and maybe are inspired to check out some Pussy Riot…
NOTE: I’ve reached out to the Film Photography Project for their input/troubleshooting advice on where the damage may have occurred in the workflow and will amend the article after I hear back from them.
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Ibraar Hussain on Pussy Riot live from the Police State!
Comment posted: 10/01/2026
Unfortunately the US has been under some form of police state since 11th of September 2001, greatly expanded during Trump and Covid and now almost a fully fledged Goon ‘papers please’ innocent murdering fascist Trumpoid right wing imperialist hell hole. Soon to be coming to a western country near us all.
Keep up the fight brother !
#anarchism.
(Opinions are my own)
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Stephen Hanka on Pussy Riot live from the Police State!
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David Pauley on Pussy Riot live from the Police State!
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Benjamin Chan on Pussy Riot live from the Police State!
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Art Meripol on Pussy Riot live from the Police State!
Comment posted: 10/01/2026
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Walter Reumkens on Pussy Riot live from the Police State!
Comment posted: 10/01/2026
I don't think any of them are successful, except perhaps the last one. You always try too many new things and don't build enough on previous experience. In my humble opinion, you used the wrong films with the camera's internal exposure meter, which is out of place. An external exposure based on the average value of light and shadow with a proven, highly sensitive Kodak TMax or even a TriX would have been better. Please excuse my frankness, but it is often beneficial. Perhaps you should think about it.
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Gary Smith on Pussy Riot live from the Police State!
Comment posted: 10/01/2026
While the photos are clearly not up to Walter's standards, I think most of us get it. I've shot live shows and I appreciate the energy as well as the political message.
I'm ashamed to be subject to the childish whims of an authoritarian dictator wannabe. To think that after 70+ years I have nothing in my experience that helps me to understand how to deal with our current situation. I can only hope that November will bring enough of a shift that an impeachment and conviction will happen.
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Curtis Heikkinen on Pussy Riot live from the Police State!
Comment posted: 11/01/2026
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David Hume on Pussy Riot live from the Police State!
Comment posted: 11/01/2026
I’ll cut Walter some slack because of the translation; I’d never think I could comment on a German language site. I love it when we get people here from places other than the UK and the US - no disrespect to your good self of course. I agree with a bit of what he says, and disagree with more of it, and I think here’s where the constructive discussion can take place.
I think it’s fine to try out these films without knowing what you’d get and just seeing what happens… Why not? It’s not like you’re covering it for Newsweek - you’re having an experiment and seeing what you can learn. Isn’t that the point?
Now forgive me if any of the following seems like I’m telling you how to suck eggs, but I seem to recall that you’re not much in for postprocessing and I feel this is a place where these pictures would benefit. It’s not a question of destroying their fresh and rough feel, to my mind it’s more a question of removing some distracting areas that take attention away from other areas of the image, and if our attention is not distracted by these then the image becomes stronger without losing its charm.
And again forgive me if you’ve considered this already, but I think when it comes to looking at print and scans on a photography site, there are certain conventions that are going to come in to play when it comes to printing or looking at negs/scans. So an audience that is very familiar with this will notice certain things that other people will not. The main points that are distracting to my eyes are completely blown out highlights in faces and clothes which become blobs of pure white. (“the neg may be blocked in the highlight”) Now, I’m not sure if there is anything recoverable on the negative or not. I offer to have a look at some of your raw scans and post process them and see if I can send you back something that you would find more pleasing. If you’d like me to do that, you know how to get in touch. In the darkroom days if a negative was completely blocked and there was no information in it there was a technique called “flashing” where a tiny bit of external light is put onto the paper before printing. So the print does not end up with any more information in it, but the areas of pure white become less distracting because there is some tone in it. That’s what I would do if there was nothing recoverable in these highlights, except do it to the scan not a print of course.
To get over the problem that you had with the rapidly changing light I think what I would’ve done was to use manual exposure on the camera based on what I estimated to be a good exposure that would hold some details in skin in the brightest areas. What matters is the faces of course and it gets a little bit distracting when the facemasks become blobs. Especially if you’re not a Pussy Riot aficionado and didn’t know that’s what they are. So you could help your audience out a bit by fixing that up. Of course I was not there, and I might be wrong but generally I would say that certainly with stage lighting of this nature the light isn’t changing much except for follow spots and things. And so if a reading on her face is going to work when the singer is at the mike, that’s really all you need to know. I’m actually thinking more about theatre lighting here, which is the only area where I really have an experience. But you wouldn’t be changing the theatre lights all that much in one scene. The meter in the camera will be swinging around wildly as composition changes, but the exposure you should be using will be pretty much the same. So when things are nice and calm, you get your reading and then you stick with it. I think that’s probably the best you can do in this situation even if it’s not ideal.
In terms of the photos themselves, you’re right I believe, and that photograph of Nadya with her book is a killer. I do think it’s worth playing with it a bit - in her face. Or at least playing with the levels going up and down. You can make her more or less mask-like. Remember that your negative is only the score. And your final print (or processed scan) is the performance, to go back to uncle Ansel. And I reckon here is where I would be all preachy and say that if you’re not interested in doing this please at least try it or see what someone who’s into retouching would do because it would make a difference to the quality of the work. And I think you would find it more satisfying to see the results then and unprocessed scan. And also, while you might like the work, those whose eyes are more heavily trained in the technicalities will see certain things more than you do, and find those distracting. So they are getting distracted by things that probably don’t bother you. Please understand that I mean deviations from conventional technique, which of course once you master you can do with as you damn well please. But it’s important to know how your decisions deviate from conventional thought. It’s about communicating with people after all, and there will be those who don’t notice the difference and there will be those who do. So you are increasing the number of people who will be responding positively to your image without compromising your vision. So I like to think about photographs as a means of visually communicating with a wide audience. And I always want my work to appeal to both an experienced finer printer and anyone else interested in looking at it. I don’t think the two are mutually exclusive, in fact I think this a worthy aim.
You may of course know all of this already… So I hope it’s not redundant, but as you said above even if there’s no news here for you, someone reading this might learn something of interest. Anyway, it’s clearly more than enough for one comment. Like I say – if you care to, flick me your top three scans and I’ll send them back.