| Popis: |
In the wake of the dissolution of the USSR, not all statues and other monuments dedicated to Lenin have suffered the same fate in the former Soviet republics. In Ukraine, for example, the “decommunisation” of the country meant that almost all the Soviet emblems were lost as collateral victims of the struggle to free themselves from the influence of the imposing Russian neighbour. In Central Asia, too, statues of Lenin have often been replaced by monuments to the new leaders, establishing their own cult of personality. In Kyrgyzstan, however, the memory of Lenin and his most famous statuary representation - the Lenin statue on Ala-Too Square in the centre of the city of Bishkek - has had a special destiny: untouched for over a decade after the collapse of communism, the monument was protected by a decree as a national heritage in 2000. And finally, when, in 2003, the government after all decided to remove the monument, it was then relocated only several meters from its original location. Far from signing its death, this relocation led to a re-reading of the monument and took on a plurality of uses in an unofficial register of representation. As symbols of a potentially controversial memory, the statues have regularly aroused strong “heritage emotions” (Fabre, 2013). In the wake of the claims expressed by the “Black Lives Matters” movement, this project proposes to examine the circumstances and forms of reappropriation of this particular statuary heritage. The importance of the monument as a referent in the rhetorical confrontations around power cannot be reduced to a clear-cut alternative between construction and destruction. From graffiti to decapitation and hijacking, citizens intervene in the public space to make claims, denounce, support or ignore. In the light of these repertoires of actions, we will analyse what the statues “say” or, rather, what they are made to say. |
