Pussy Riot’s Nadya Tolokonnikova is no stranger to hot water, especially when it comes to her relationship with her home country of Russia.
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Now, the singer and activist is on the Russian government’s most-wanted list. She’s reportedly under investigation for anti-Christian social media posts, The Associated Press reports.
This week, the Russian news source Mediazona found Tolokonnikova’s name in an entry in the database for the Russian Interior Ministry’s most wanted individuals. The entry isn’t clear as to what the charges are against Tolokonnikova, but the music outlet Pitchfork discovered court documents since translated from Pussy Riot’s team that says that the singer/activist is being investigated for Instagram posts.
Tolokonnikova is being looked at for “an expression of obvious disrespect,” reads the translation from Pitchfork. That has to do with an NFT the band made in 2021 showing the Virgin Mary as a vagina.
Consequence reports that the artist finds herself on the wanted list weeks after being part of an art installation called “Putin’s Ashes.” For that, a group of women burned a portrait of the oligarch before stabbing the ashes into the ground.
“Coincidentally my Instagram vanished and this new criminal case was announced within a week of the show,” said Tolokonnikova in a statement to Rolling Stone. “Police detained friends and family, and my lawyers sent me the documents they found.”
There is another investigation into the band, stemming from their 2012 protest and subsequent arrest.
Earlier this month, Pussy Riot received the 2023 Woody Guthrie Prize, given to artists who exemplify the late folk artist’s “spirit and work by speaking for the less fortunate” and “serving as a positive force for social change.”
Pussy Riot has a North American and European string of tour dates kicking off next month.
Check out Tolokonnikova’s comments on being put on the wanted list below, including her “official comment” which is making fun of Russia and its police.
“oopsie i was just added to russia’s federal wanted list,” she wrote. “My official comment: (emojis – police car and fire plus clown and russian flag).
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