Russian Political Posters

Following our earlier post on a Grani.ru political poster of Vladimir Putin congratulating Vladimir Putin as the next president, a frequent Russian reader sent in a number of other posters from the same contest (these have appeared online elsewhere back in September). The jury of the competition included artists, writers, journalists, and public figures: Elena Bereznitskaya-Burni, Andrey Bilzho, Alexey Venediktov, Igor Irteniev, Vladimir Korsunsky, Roman Leibov, Sergey Parkhomenko, Lev Rubinstein, Irina Hakamada, Grigory Chkhartishvili, Viktor Shenderovich, Irina Yasina. Also on the jury was the poet and artist Dmitry Alexandrovich Prigov, who died in July of this year. Two posters share the first place prize: “Flipping the Bird” and “System Error.” [“Flipping the bird”]. The text reads “200-Infinity” The artist is a 24-year-old web designer from Moscow named Dmirty (he did not desire to give his surname). The main prize – 2500 dollars – he divided with 27-year-old video engineer Maxim Zakharov from Kaliningrad, who is the artist of “System Error”

«System error». The text reads “RUSSIA. Unrecoverable error: 2000-2008. System must be reinstalled.” – by Maxim Zakharov, co-winner of the poster contest.«Chekists on duty to the last drop…». This phrase, as it is usually used, refers to loyalty to the last drop of blood.Second place was shared by Yevgeni Mikhailov from Tatarstan (the poster «Chekists on duty to the last drop» and Sergey Sorokin from Komi (the poster «Kaput»). Their authors will receive $500 each. Sorokin is the editor-in-chief of the newspaper «Zyryanskaya zhizn», which was shut down by the authorities and comes out now only on the internet.«Kaput». As seen through the glass, the labels on the bottles of Putinka vodka (which actually exists) read KAPUT.The text reads “KGB” and “Putya ‘Third term’”.«Apotheosis»The text reads “PUTIN / INSTEAD OF / THE TRUTH”The text reads “Children, be vigilant! He may return!”