Mon Levčenkovaitė 12/01/2024 Mon Levčenkovaitė 12/01/2024

on the subject of ‘‘good russians’’ and world press photo

It has been a long time coming but today I am writing about something that I care about deeply. This letter is aimed at my peers in England as well as Europe.

My name is Monika Levčenkovaitė and I am a citizen of Lithuania - a country that fought for its independence and finally was able to gain it in 1990 on March 11th. However, that came with its challenges as it was hard for the soviet union to accept that we wanted our culture, our language, and our land to be freed from the poisonous soviet regime. In January of 1991, 140 people were injured and 14 were killed in Vilnius - the capital of my homeland.

On the 11th of January, we were presented with an ultimatum from Gorbachev, demanding that Lithuania comply with their request. They requested that Lithuania must restore the constitution of the USSR and revoke all anti constitutional laws. From the morning soviet military units seized the national defence department and the press house in Vilnius. The same happened with the national defence department in Alytus and Šiauliai. Several people were hospitalised because soviet soldiers used live ammunition against civilians who were protecting their homeland. By the evening, a TV retransmission centre was also seized.

On this day in 1991, January 12th Lithuania tried to contact Gorbachev three times but was unsuccessful. Vladislav Achalov (deputy minister of defence of the soviet union) made his way to Lithuania and took control of all military operations. The units attempted to seize the police academy in Vilnius and soldiers attacked a border post near Varėna (my home region). In Kaunas, a soviet military truck kills a civilian in a vehicle while three others sustained serious injuries and had to be hospitalised. In Vilnius, people are serving piping hot tea to civilians as they start to encircle the main strategic buildings to protect them - the supreme council, the radio and television committee, the Vilnius TV tower and the main telephone exchange. On the evening of the 12th, a column of soviet military units leave a military base and move towards the capital.

On Sunday 13th January 1991, another column of military units leaves a military base and heads towards the TV tower. About an hour later, they fire blank rounds but the Lithuanian people do not move, they do not back down. About half an hour later, they began to fire live ammunition into civilian crowds outside of the TV tower. The tanks drive through our people and fourteen are killed. Most of them were shot and crushed by tanks. At 2:00 AM, tanks and other military units surround the radio and television committee building and the soldiers fire live ammunition at it, which narrowly misses the heads of civilians. A live television broadcast was later terminated and the last pictures transmitted are of a soviet soldier running towards and turning off the camera. Half an hour later, a studio in Kaunas begins to broadcast, calling for ANYONE who could help broadcast to the world in as many different languages as possible about the killing of unarmed civilians by soviet soldiers and their tanks. Two threatening phone calls were made to the studio with the request from a soviet commander, who stated that they “would not try to take over the studio so long as no misinformation is given”.

Large crowds of Lithuanians gathered around the Supreme Council building. People built anti tank barricades and set up internal defences in the building. Our people sang our songs, prayed, and made it clear that we are independent. The military tanks, trucks, and other units that were moving towards the supreme council finally began to retreat. All of this is just the tip of the iceberg - ask me about the 1940s and I will gladly tell you everything I know.

What I find disappointing and infuriating is that none of my peers know a thing about the Baltics or my homeland and no, they don’t seem to know anything about Ukraine or in fact, Eastern Europe either. The only thing they can say with absolute sincerity on their part is that the girls from that corner of the world are very beautiful. The only thing that they can point out to me is not my achievements but the fact that I have ‘Russian’ cheekbones/features. They do not want to hear my stories or about my life, because they interrupt me to ask whether everyone in Lithuania speaks in Russian - but aren’t the two languages the same? Aren’t they very similar? But there’s a lot of Russians, right? They ask me, a woman from the land that was raped and defiled by Russians. What a privilege to be in the company of such educated people in the capital of England - ha!

It pains me to say it but these people hold powerful positions in the circles of photojournalism and documentary photography — these people who confused my country for Russia - are in charge of educational institutions, organisations, and foundations that are willingly and openly letting Russians join them, join us. Not only do these Russians get a warm invitation, but also a platform and protection from the very people who taught me about what photojournalism is and can be.

Forgive me if I say that you disappoint me, anger me, and upset me by these narrow minded and spineless actions and takes of yours. Let me make this very clear - you do not get to decide who the good Russians are. You do not get to tell generations of victims of the ruZZian and soviet regimes that we MUST ACCEPT AND WELCOME ruZZian artists to our spaces. How dare you put more weight on their voices and stories over our experiences? You are demanding that we share our safe spaces with your friend, the coloniser who is committing genocide on our land. How dare you use your own anecdotal stories and your relationships with these people who you labeled as “GOOD RUSSIANS” to turn our opinions and morals into something that resembles your own? How dare you overlook our pain and the genocide we saw on our lands and how dare you put our pain aside as if genocide, rape, and invasion mean nothing?

Last year in September I visited the Lithuanian National Museum which hosted two very important exhibitions about how ruZZia used the arts to ‘blur’ the lines between Lithuanian culture and their own in the means of stamping out ours. Their favourite phrase to label our art was ‘unresolved compositions’ - meaning that the artistic level of the work and interpretation of the work which does not conform with the ‘official’ ideological line must and cannot be shown to the public. These works and genuine expressions of our people were replaced with art that had to align with the soviet system and most importantly, CELEBRATED the soviet state and its leaders. And so ruZZian work was showcased, funded, and pushed into our faces in their attempt to shift the historical narrative and go against our collective memory. The soviet regime poured money into programs that allowed ruZZians to spread their narrative of history, which denied that the people of Lithuania were ever unhappy with the occupation. At the same time, the regime also implemented tactics beyond our capital and big cities and targeted our folk traditions (which were always preserved by rural farm communities), practices, art, and music. They were dangerous as they reinforced our national identity which they were so very scared of (and still are).

So I am sitting here, in shock as I see WORLD PRESS PHOTO announced their ‘Europe’ jury with a RUSSIAN photographer, Mary Gelman! The one who traveled to occupied Crimea (Yalta) whose captions haunt me “A seagull flew by and I fired the camera like a gun” and actions of following a woman who did not want to be photographed inspire the same feeling of discomfort. Let’s not forget her filming of a ruZZian soldier who participated in the genocide of Ukrainians. Let us not forget her participation with VII (a dusty, busted, and problematic network of photographers that actually labeled Gelman to be from THE BALTICS) to raise funds to train Ukrainian journalists. Is this what makes her “one of the good ones”? Should I open my arms and welcome her and others like her because of this? The photograph in question is a scene of a ballet class in ruZZia (yes, you are reading this correctly - a photograph of ruZZian ballerinas in ruZZia was presumably bought by people who want to support Ukraine - make it make sense). Ballet also happens to be another propaganda tool of ruZZia but my dear friends in photojournalism don’t know about that, do they? So they fight with me and tell me that this is not perverse — that this is not offensive and that Mary is “in constant danger in St Petersburg”. What a joke.

So no, I will not accept any of your GOOD RUZZIANS, because I don’t TRUST ANY RUZZIANS. I do not want their culture, their words, their art, or their people. I do not accept any of them. So I must say listen to us, learn our history, and learn that you cannot trust any ruZZian in a time of

G E N O C I D E.

Mon Levčenkovaitė 13/10/2023 Mon Levčenkovaitė 13/10/2023

Math

When I was in secondary school, I stapled my arms in maths class whilst my boy friends expressed excitement and adoration. The truth is that I didn’t feel the staples and I would examine them afterwards, along with my friends. Look how you pierced your skin, gnarly. During my school years, I was friends with a lot of boys and often flitted from one group to the other. I always had a base group of girls that were all huge personalities but just preferred to spend time with the boys. I feel I have an answer to this now.

My brain feels excited at the thought of making a connection that fits perfectly. Between the ages of 1 and 7, my father taught me how to self harm. There was punching glass with your fist - but my skin was too soft at first so he came up with an alternative, crushing glass in your hands. You hold the glass and make a very tight fist. We did this behind the arches he built that stood opposite our house. The only thing to separate them was the farm garden we had. We planted carrots, potatoes, zucchini, cucumbers, tomatoes.. the list goes on. However, methods would evolve over time into something more. Another one was when he would take me to cafes and restaurants after he sexually used and abused me. I could never eat the food because it made me sick, so we would end up staying at our table for a long time. He pushed a lit candle towards me and his hand floated over to the flame. His smile was so wide and he never showed any suggestion of pain. Now it was my turn. We could spend the rest of the day just trying to get my hand to sit over the flame. The wide smile returned to his face. At home, I spent a lot of time in his garage which was next to our living room. He would cut his skin open and show it to me and then continue on with his work, bleeding. He would look over and smile - no pain.

In time, he built a sauna for us which was nothing new to our neighbourhood and town. Almost everyone had one because it was a part of our culture. It wasn’t the roomiest of places but there was enough space in there for four people. It was behind a door in our hallway and the sauna was divided into two seating areas which were on both ends of the room. My father locked the door and put me up on the upper seat, which is the hottest part of the sauna. I felt like a dragon and breathing was intense and hard for me. I sat up there battling with 80 degree heat and humidity thinking if this is how it feels like to die in a fire. The idea of saying any words seemed impossible to me. Everything was hot and thick. I’m drowning in a fire. Shortly afterwards, my nosebleed begins and I see my fathers eyes. They were more reflective - like when you see the rays of sunshine on water shine back at you. We were in a different place now and I could tell just by his eyes. My mum is on the other side of the door, shouting at him to immediately open the door. He doesn’t listen and watches the river of blood travel all the way down to the wood of the sauna bench I was sitting on. He didn’t do this often because it was hard to get away with it without being caught. Not that he cared at all — when my mum or any other person protested his behaviour, he would simply break their ankle, slap them or do much worse to shut them up. He reassured that he was protecting me and that he would never do such a thing to me. Uh huh, I nodded. I didn’t believe him, I didn’t believe in anything in this world.

I didn’t have a choice in the matter of self harm or suffering for the pleasure of my father. I was the object of his pain and I was a mirror to him. I was his reflection and he could do whatever he wanted, because it was him and not me. I exist behind the mirror, on the other side of it.. or more realistically, I do not exist at all. When he put my hands into the fireplace to test my pain it would seem that he made me into his salvation. When the pain was too much for me and tears rolled down my face, he would push me to hold on a little longer - and I did, I held onto pain for him. He was thrilled and his eyes were so shiny. I had no other expectations of my father.

So when I sat down with my emo friends with maths class, I had no other talent than to show than the pain that I was forcing onto myself. This was much easier than confronting my bad maths skills, which started back at home in reception. Imagine going through these trials every single day, all the whilst seeing your mother being tortured and your brother being beaten - this was playing in my mind every single day, even into my years of secondary school. Imagine trying to learn maths whilst you still know your mother is tied to a tree outside; hoping she’s not dead, hoping to not find her lifeless body on the forest floor after school.

Mon Levčenkovaitė 13/10/2023 Mon Levčenkovaitė 13/10/2023

inheritance

From my father I inherited the inability to be in my own body and mind. My body does not exist and I do not want to exist as this. I beat myself to feel aches in my body and to remind myself that I have one. The blood I spill is the colour of most of my childhood. They say blood is the colour of passion. My father had a passion for his blood and my own. He shed my blood as if it was his own. I choke myself in the kitchen just to feel some sensation of my life leaving my body, as if I knew what life is. Even now as I sound all of my thoughts through these words, my hands are not my own. I feel as if they’re moving like a marionette across my keyboard. The keyboard on my lap feels so far away from this body. I feel like my head is floating. Like I’m on the guillotine.

My father undressed me and inserted his body and fingers into me. Some people have no body and possess a mind, but in these years I feel as if I have neither. No body, no mind. I know when I look down at the floor, I can see my feet and legs. But they don’t belong to me, they don’t belong to anyone.

Now I feel further away. I feel it is harder to form coherent sentences. When my father didn’t use me, some other man did. Maybe that’s why I had so many male friends in school. I was used to being around groups of men. And I repress myself like a man. I keep myself silent, like a man.

What did he do to me in the forest? What did he do to my body when he took me there? Who else touched me not as a child, but as a woman when in fact I was a c h i l d. From my father I inherited an ability to not believe in anyone. Their words - lies. Their actions, always suspicious.

From my my father, I inherited a feeling of disgust towards myself.

We didn’t have a bath, we didn’t have a shower. We had an outdoor toilet. I could never clean myself. I could never clean the abuse away from myself. I had to exist with it on my skin. His fingerprints and impressions that they left were with me for days. As a 30 year old, I am a bath lover - it is a haven for me. As a little girl, it was a space for me to exist with myself.

I feel better when I have a fever - when it feels like I am unsticking myself from my own body. When everything feels as if it was a figment of my own imagination, falling.

Keistas jausmas apima mane, nes ši vieta nėra įsivaizduojami namai – tai fizinė realybė. Sienos tvirtos, yra metalo ir akmens. Aš girdėjau, kad akmens skulptūros yra amžina žmogaus forma.

Strange feeling washes over me because this place is not an imagined home - it is a physical reality. The walls are solid, there is metal and stone. I heard that stone sculptures are the human form made eternal.