Завотделом Эрмитажа Дмитрий Озерков, проработавший в музее 22 года, уволился из-за несогласия с войной

dimitri ozerkov в Instagram : "I am back to Instagram being no longer an employee of the Hermitage museum after 22 years of work there. I decided to quit after the war started. The final decision was taken after the interview with museum’s director general was published. I handed over the part of print collection I was responsible for and, since early March, I haven’t participated in any museum’s activities. I left because I don’t intend to have anything in common with today’s Russia. In 2006, when the Contemporary Art Dptm was conceived and started to be created by the director general, it was seen as a new integral part of the museum, able to revive the old collection and give it new vectors of development and interpretation, capable of giving classical art a new way to speak. It was an ambitious and powerful project that influenced the image and shaped the status of the museum. It was built on dialogue and mutual respect for languages ​​and countries, nationalities and religions, history and modernity. As part of the 2014 Manifesta, the General Staff could display works by Boris Mikhailov and Russian portraits by Marlene Dumas. New works by Anselm Kiefer were shown in the Nicholas Hall in 2017, pieces by Jan Fabre were widespread throughout the whole museum in 2016. After Russia sent its troops to Ukraine dialogue and respect ceased to mean anything in Russia, the news were replaced by propaganda that says nothing about Russian armed forces to be accused of numerous crimes against the civilian population. As a Russian citizen I saw this shame as my own fault too and I shared this opinion. Then my choice was to stop doing anything in and for today’s Russia. I left the posts of the head of the ITMO’s A&S program, of the curator of Zifergauz, of the curator of MastersDigital and other local projects. I quit the City Council for Culture under the Governor of St. Petersburg. I salute all for whom the Greek word Exodus, used by the writers of the Septuagint, has become the only possible way out of the current situation. Russia squeezed out all of us who wanted nothing but good to its culture."