When I first pursued Gergiev in 2005 for permission to make a documentary film about him, his friendly relationship with Vladimir Putin was not seen as an obstacle. As director of the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg, it was Gergiev’s duty to cultivate dealings with people in high places in the Russian government as sources of funding. The same is true for every high-level arts organization around the globe: federal and state funding is essential, and one of the most urgent responsibilities of directors of arts organizations is the development of positive working relationships with government officials, as well as private donors.
Gergiev had developed a friendship with Putin when the future President worked for the KGB in St. Petersburg. In 1991, when Putin joined the government in Moscow, on his way to the Presidency, he already regarded Gergiev as a valuable national asset, and helped channel government support to the Mariinsky. In 2009 he helped to finance construction of a new concert hall and a fully equipped opera house near the Mariinsky, all of which operate under Gergiev’s direction.
The support of the Russian government has always been crucial to Gergiev’s success—for example, the funding Gergiev received for his Mariinsky projects from Mayor Luzhkov of Moscow and National Economics Minister Gref.
Gergiev has also worked to raise funds outside of Russia. He has charmed wealthy private donors at after-concert parties during his many international conducting engagements, and worked with them to establish not-for-profit foundations to raise funds for the Mariinsky. He also strengthened the reputation of the Mariinsky by bringing its world-famous Russian stars to perform with him abroad, and he brought back European stars to perform with him at the Mariinsky. He has even donated many of his international fees to the theater.
The pressure on Gergiev to denounce Putin has been enormous. But he has not given in. In the past, artists have tried to hide their collaboration with dictators behind lofty proclamations of liberty and justice. Wilhelm Furtwängler, conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic from 1922-1945, and again after the war from 1952-54, has been praised as the greatest conductor of the first half of the twentieth century. Regarded as Hitler’s favorite conductor, Furtwängler wrote, “A true symphony has never been written by non-Germans.” He also declared that the atonality of Arnold Schoenberg was “biologically inferior.” In spite of his Nazi allegiance, he sought to foster a humanitarian reputation by claiming that he struggled to save the Jewish musicians in his orchestra.
Gergiev has persisted. He has continued to avoid criticizing Putin. Resisting steady international pressure, he has neither supported him nor criticized him. He remained silent at Putin’s annexation of Georgia in 2008, and of the Crimea in 2014, and he said nothing about the bombings and mass murders during Putin’s savage campaigns against Chechnya. There were protests at Gergiev’s silence, mostly by crowds gathered before his performances in front of European and American concert halls. Protesters waved placards and shouted that Gergiev was a Nazi, among other epithets, but his concerts went forward as scheduled, and his international engagements were not cancelled.
But when Putin invaded Ukraine February 24, 2022 and Gergiev still did not speak out against him, the world reacted with newly kindled outrage. Artists from every country denounced him, publicly and with force. What seemed like Gergiev’s approval of Putin reverberated around the world; in a matter of weeks, all of his international performances were cancelled.
Now, no one outside of Russia will engage him. Even his most devoted associate, Gavriel Heine, resigned his post as resident Conductor after 15 years at the Mariinsky, in order to move from Russia with his family. He says Gergiev gave him a hug and wished him well.
Putin has also seen a hemorrhaging of talent from the country’s leading ballet companies. When he fired Vladimir Urin as head of the Bolshoi ballet company, European dancers hired by the Bolshoi left the company as well. The biggest blow came March 16, when Bolshoi principal ballerina Olga Smirnova quit to join the Dutch National Ballet, after posting criticism of the war on the message service Telegram: “I never thought I would be ashamed of Russia,” she wrote. Putin tried to recruit Gergiev as leader of both the Bolshoi and the Mariinsky. Whether or not it was the real reason, Gergiev declined, saying that running both theaters would kill him.
Now, almost a year after Putin’s devastating invasion of Ukraine, with its wanton destruction of bridges, roadways, and apartment buildings, schools and hospitals, Gergiev still remains silent. One supposes he knew that failure to speak out against the Russian President would have disastrous consequences for his international career. Was he terrified that Putin might turn on him and find a way to jail him if he protested? Does he harbor a misguided idea of moral self-righteousness—that one does not abandon a friend even when friendship no longer has any meaning? Or does he refuse to be told by his fellow-musicians where to draw a line between politics and principles, and in fact applauds the actions of his belligerent president?
Could his silence indicate that he does not disapprove of the slaughter and destruction Putin has unleashed against Russia’s neighbor, or that he would consider it a sign of weakness to yield to the pressure of world-wide condemnation even after orchestras and opera houses around the world have cancelled all their scheduled engagements with him.
I think Gergiev has a different reason for refusing to denounce President Putin. His career has had one mission – to foster the great tradition of Russian and western musical culture through performances at the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg. Since 1996, when he was appointed Artistic Director and General Director of the Mariinsky Theater, (then the Kirov), Gergiev has dedicated himself to the strengthening of the theater as the guardian of western musical culture, especially the core Russian repertory. It is an institution that he has been building for over twenty-five years. If he were to denounce Putin, the Russian dictator would surely remove him from the Mariinsky, weakening it artistically and financially, regardless of who might be appointed to replace him – a result that would destroy all that Gergiev has achieved. His decision not to criticize Putin is in fact a moral one: to sacrifice his international career as a conductor for a cause higher than himself.
Valery Gergiev remains free to pursue his messianic goals, now performing for audiences throughout the vast Russian continent. In city after city, major ones and those difficult to locate on a map, he can continue to nurture his beloved Russian culture in what may seem to be a kind of internal exile but in fact may be a schedule rich with new opportunities.
And one day those who cursed Gergiev for his silence may come to thank him for preserving an institution with its gilded chapter in Russian artistic history that even a vicious dictator could not destroy.
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2013 – Valery Gergiev receives Hero of Labor award
