Artists Against the Kremlin: VIRUS
15 augustus – 4 september 2025
Major anti-war and dissident art exhibition vol. 2
Credit image: Walter Limo – “Salvation”
This summer, Artists Against the Kremlin returns to De Balie with the exhibition VIRUS featuring over 100 works by artists from Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, and the global diaspora—including names like Nadya Tolokonnikova (Pussy Riot), Danila Tkachenko, and Sasha Skochilenko.
The exhibition brings together artists who, among other themes, speak out against Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
All Rights Reversed is a gallery based in Berlin that promotes artists persecuted by the Russian government. It’s their mission to elevate protest voices within the art community and support artists who critique autocracy, repressions and war. The Moscow Times, the largest independent English-language news outlet covering Russia, provides vital reporting from outside the regime’s reach. Together, they have conceived this year’s theme: VIRUS. Artists Against the Kremlin vol.2.
VIRUS is a reflection on how Kremlin-style authoritarian practices are infecting other countries. Like a real virus, the Kremlin has already contaminated all of Russia and is spreading globally. Kremlin-made tools — propaganda, fake news, repressive tactics — are increasingly being adopted by governments turning away from democracy and towards authoritarianism.
Is this disease hereditary or newly acquired? Can it be cured? What can be done to stop its spread and mutations? Can democracy develop immunity?
Our artists from Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and the global diaspora explore these urgent questions through their work.
In 2025, Amsterdam celebrates its 750th birthday, and we are confident that our exhibition — officially supported by the City of Amsterdam and taking place at one of the city’s key spaces for political and artistic discourse, De Balie — will be a significant part of the celebrations of this free city’s legacy.
Vladimir Shalamov, curator of Artists Against the Kremlin and founder of All Rights Reversed
Participating artists include:
Nadya Tolokonnikova (Pussy Riot), Danila Tkachenko, Sasha Skochilenko, Artyom Loskutov, Aysha Demina, Marat Guelman & Plus Minus Comma, Ruaction Berlin, Serafima Bresler, Yana Tark, Masha Bolotina, Anastasiya Egonyan, Daria Apakhonchich, Liza Pushkina, The Party of the Dead, Kungfuct, Mikhail Ray, Vladlena Sandu, artisterror, Nadya Raplya, Sergei Karev, Paulina Sinyatkina & Johannes Hogenbrink, Alice Femina, Milada Kopeliovich, Udoli, Walter Limo, Tanya Tanys, Lisaveta Nikulicheva, Pomidor art group, Jim Tvaroh, Roma Soyerov, Anita Turadzhanova and many more.
Photo’s of exhibition 2024
2 & 3 by Charlotte de Condé
For more information and to support the exhibition via the crowdfunding campaign, visit https://artists-against-the-kremlin.com/
Video impression Artist against The Kremlin 2024‘
The exposition last year gained more than 5000 visitors, and national and international media coverage from Trouw, Parool, ZDF and more.
About All Rights Reversed & The Moscow Times
All Rights Reversed is a Berlin-based gallery, production team, and community of artists united by human values and a clear anti-war stance. Its interests revolve around themes such as anti-war narratives, Russian imperialism, decolonialism, human rights, inequality, anti-propaganda, LGBTQ+ rights, and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). All Rights Reversed gathered the largest collection of protest art to date, featuring over 150 original artworks.
Since September 2023, the gallery has organized seven exhibitions of anti-war and protest art across Europe, attracting more than 5,000 guests. One of these exhibitions took place at ‘het Vrije Paleis’ in February 2024. The exhibition featured 95 works by 65 artists and was visited by around 1,000 guests over four days.
The Moscow Times is the oldest independent Russian media outlet, informing the world about what happens in and around Russia since 1992. The Moscow Times is not just a media outlet in English and Russian, but also a platform for exchanging opinions and acting as a bridge between the East and the West. Since 2022, The Moscow Times has been based in Amsterdam.
As part of the exhibition we organize a special screening of Mr. Nobody Against Putin on 30 August:
As Russia launches its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, primary schools across Russia are transformed into recruitment stages for the war. Facing the ethical dilemma of working in a system defined by propaganda and violence, a brave teacher starts filming what’s really happening in his own school.
