VILNIUS ( LITHUANIA ): Unimpressed by the substitute for Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s” Nutcracker”, the mother and her young daughter left at the intermission, a small protest over a decision by the opera house not to perform the Russian composer’s Christmas classic. Egle Brediene, 38, who was rushing out of Lithuania’s National Opera and Ballet Theatre this past week after the initial work of a replacement dance composed by an European, said,” All about” The Nutcracker” is much better.
Lithuania, an unwavering admirer of Ukraine in the warfare waged by Russia, set off Tchaikovsky and the trip preferred two years ago after declaring a “mental isolation” from Russian society. The theatergoers began to groan after that, but their displeasure waned mainly until a new government took office in Lithuania this quarter and a newly elected culture minister declared he enjoyed hearing Tchaikovsky. There was no cause, the chancellor, Sarunas Birutis, said in an interview, to become “afraid that after watching a Christmas fairy stories we may be pro-Kremlin”. His comments sparked a bitter controversy about whether culture and politics can be cut off during a time of war, igniting applause from Ukrainian music fans and applause from enthusiasts of Russian songs. Many in the arts world oppose the prohibition of works based on their ethnicity, believing that politics should not be a source of conflict because culture has the power to connect people.
Darius Kuolys, a former of Lithuania’s challenges to break free from the Soviet Union and who served as the country’s first culture minister following its declaration of independence in 1990, said it was evident that the Kremlin frequently abused society to serve political purposes. He continued,” It never occurred to me as a secretary to dictate what to watch or listen to.” Despite a terrible assault by Russian troops in Vilnius, Lithuania’s money, in Jan 1991, Kuolys did not wait shows of” The Nutcracker” or attempt to withdraw Igor Stravinsky’s” Rite of Spring”. ” We fought Russian energy to get the freedom not to boycott stuff”, said Kuolys, 62.
Simonas Kairys, the culture minister who pushed in 2022 for the isolation from Soviet influence embedded in song, insisted that he had never banned something and only issued “recommendations” to the national musical property and other state-funded organizations, which immediately pulled” The Nutcracker” and other Russian functions.
German composers such as Ludwig van Beethoven were featured in a series of concerts held at Britain’s National Gallery during World War II. This was intended to demonstrate that Britain’s conflict was with Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, not with Germany as a country or culture, according to the gallery’s director at the time. Many in Lithuania and other nations with a long and agonizing history of past Russian occupation are now unsure whether culture can be stifled by the fear of Russia and the anger over its invasion of Ukraine. ” In Russia, it’s always been mixed”, said Arunas Gelunas, director of the Lithuanian National Museum of Art. The Kremlin has long drawn attention to its crimes by using classical culture.
