Paul
Goble
Staunton, March 6 – Damir Muratov,
the artist who designed the United States of Siberia flag that has been
displayed in exhibits and in demonstrations in various cities, says he is involved
in coming up with a new language that reflects the distinctiveness of Siberian
culture rather than promoting any independence movement.
Nonetheless, he says, “Siberia still
remains a colony, with most of its people consisting of those who fled or were
exiled from elsewhere. There was no serfdom in Siberia and so the mentality
here is somewhat different from European regions of Russia.” (afterempire.info/2018/03/06/damir/).
In
addition, Muratov says, “one should not forget that the national composition
[of Siberia’s population] is extremely varied: one should not talk only about
Russians say or only about Tatars. And so this really in a certain way recalls
the early United States, as I have symbolically presented in my picture” of a
Siberian flag.
This
flag, despite the claims of its opponents, is not the banner of any Siberian
national movement, the artist says. Rather one should see it as “a flag which
unifies Siberia’s creative people” who feel tied to the region but want to give
it a new language and a new way of viewing the world.
Muratov
says he is skeptical of any plans for independence, despite the natural wealth
of Siberia, given that the 15 million people who live in the region are so
widely dispersed. More important, he continues, “the Siberian people is only
just being formed,” a process that really has begun only in “the era of the
post-Soviet space.”
Siberians,
he continues, believe that they will always live in this region even if they go
to Russia or Europe for a time; and they want a language to distinguishes them
from others. They want their lives to be
interesting and dynamic on their own and not as a copy of anyone else’s. What
happens next will depend on what officials do and “the psychology of local
residents.”
No comments:
Post a Comment