Russian artists protest against Putin

An artist holds the portrait of Russian President Vladimir Putin Moscow - AFP Masses of Russian artists with brooms in hand carted their most expressive works across the boulevards of Moscow Saturday in a show of exasperation at Vladimir Putin’s return to a third Kremlin term. Several thousand Muscovites joined them in a second such intellectual walk in a week. More than 10,000 had supported a group of writers last week on a quiet stroll along the very same streets. Russia’s nascent protest movement is busy seeking new strategies to maintain its relevance under Putin’s new term while avoiding the violent confrontations with police that have estranged them from some supporters. Both sides seem willing to accept the country’s writers and artists as a suitable form of expression of mild criticism. The 25 or so of Moscow’s more well-known contemporary artists who organized Saturday’s event were careful not to mention Putin directly. Some of the more eye-catching works included a man pushing a bed frame put together with barbed wire instead of mattress strings.