Pussy Riot To Receive 2023 Woody Guthrie Prize As The Band’s Nadya Tolokonnikova Added To Russia’s Most Wanted List

Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images for ABA

Pussy Riot To Receive 2023 Woody Guthrie Prize As The Band’s Nadya Tolokonnikova Added To Russia’s Most Wanted List

Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images for ABA

The punk collective Pussy Riot continue to make music and protest against the Russian government. Last week, it was announced that they would receive the 2023 Woody Guthrie Prize, an award given out annually “to an artist who best exemplifies Woody Guthrie’s spirit and work by speaking for the less fortunate through music, film, literature, dance or other art forms and serving as a positive force for social change.” Group member Maria “Masha” Alyokhina and creator Nadya Tolokonnikova will be in attendance to accept the award on May 6 at the Woody Guthrie Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Today, news broke that Tolokonnikova has been recently added to Russia’s most wanted list. As the Associated Press reports, the Pussy Riot leader was discovered in a database of individuals wanted by the Russian Interior Ministry for unspecified criminal charges. Tolokonnikova has already spent nearly two years in Russian prison after being arrested in 2012 following a protest. She’s since left the country, and in 2021 was designated by the Russian government as a “foreign agent.”

In a statement issued last week upon learning that Pussy Riot was to receive the Woody Guthrie Award, Tolokonnikova said:

It feels fitting to be awarded in the spirit of Woody, I think he would love Pussy Riot’s anti-fascist message. Usually, when Pussy riot gets added to lists, it’s not always a good thing, but we are honored to be on this one.

We don’t really do folk, but we don’t really do punk either, we simply scream and protest as loud as we can, and hope we can show others they can do the same. Like Woody said, any fool can make something complicated, our message is clear and simple. Anyone can be Pussy Riot. Riot. Riot. Resist.

Oh and a quick reminder to Vladimir Putin and anyone who supports his Z regime … All you fascists are bound to lose.

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