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March 5th, 2011 § 2 Comments
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January 31st, 2011 § 1 Comment
One to stand for thirty-one
January 31st, 2011 § Leave a Comment
Marianna’s photo for January 31
January 31st, 2011 § Leave a Comment
Finally, one more scene from Marta’s library in Moscow: here she is with a photocopy machine for public use, unheard of in Soviet times. Photocopy machines were seen as serious threats to the Soviet state because information was controlled from the top, and these machines allowed who knows how many people access to who knows what. So to see a photocopy machine in public space, for public use, is a real statement of change.
Marianna’s photo for January 30
January 30th, 2011 § Leave a Comment
Moscow neighborhood public library, early 1990s. Marta, the library director, is standing by a most unusual collection: telephone books from Russian cities. In Soviet times information was guarded carefully, and telephone numbers were hard to get. Now, in post-Soviet Russia, librarians like Marta were eager to put all the information they could before their users.
Marianna’s photo for January 29
January 29th, 2011 § Leave a Comment
Marianna’s photo for January 28
January 28th, 2011 § Leave a Comment
In 1992, soon after the collapse of the Soviet Union, I attended a session at a conference held in Moscow. You see the sign for the conference: “The KGB, Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow.” At the session an audience of former dissidents, survivors of the Gulag, human rights activists, hurled angry questions and comments at former members of the KGB, the dreaded Soviet secret police. The audience was dressed in jeans and leather jackets. The panelists wore well-cut European suits. Disorienting!




































