Why was Kirill Serebrennikov closed? The arrest of Kirill Serebrennikov outraged and rallied the figures of Russian culture

“Fell with laughter overboard yachts”

Personally, I absolutely don’t care if there was a boy. That is, whether or not these were used "for other purposes", or even stolen by the "criminal group organized by Serebrennikov" (as it was stated even before the trial), either 200 million, or 70 million once wooden rubles that had risen from their knees ... That is something around 1 million euros. Just?! And the fuss!

That is, no, if, say, we lived in some scatty France, where the former Prime Minister Fillon, who lathered for president, was simply rolled into asphalt by an indignant community of free citizens for some 500 thousand euros that were not even stolen, but paid for several (!) years by the salary of a half-wife for working as an adviser to her own husband ... Then, of course, yes.

By the way, after all, no one has ever proved that at night on the marital bed, this Penelope did not give her beloved Francois, among other things, wise state advice for the benefit of the prosperity of her native Fifth Republic? A? But after all, they rolled the unfortunate one.

But! We don't live in France after all. And in our country, the wives of government officials and oligarchs, for example, having heard about the arrest of the director Serebrennikov for "inappropriately" wasted million, fell, like drinking water, with laughter overboard luxury yachts. And, therefore, they got right into the azure crystal waters foaming with white sparkling waves, which these yachts ply all year round, even without a weekend break, with periodic uploading of Dolce Vita in various Facebook-Instagrams and other glamorous resources... By the way, uploading it completely unpunished - not only with an indifferent attitude, but with a demonstrative indifference of the same Investigative Committee, the prosecutor's office and other state bodies and supervisory institutions, sometimes suddenly recalling the state interest with some kind of fright. As now with Serebrennikov.

In contrast to the fattening bureaucratic wives with their swollen husbands, the director’s activity also brought glory to the country, which, in principle, cannot be assessed by any material yardstick. Is there a lot of such glory in the luggage of bureaucratic wives, as well as their faithful ones? In addition to shame and dishonor ...

By the way, there would be even more glory if Serebrennikov had time to release, for example,. Did not have time. Not allowed. It is clear now - they were in a hurry with the planned arrest in a demonstration campaign of intimidation. Instead of glory - a little more tar in a barrel of shame. But it's already full!

But they don't give a damn, like me - these SC Philippics. They laugh on their yachts, watch the news, point their fingers at gadget screens, and convulse on decks made of rare natural wood...

And why? Yes, because! They are "friends" - in the very system in which the "principled" middle class does not look at faces (not only some governors, but, look, famous directors), but in which there is one small but significant squiggle. If you are in "friends", then everything is for you, and so - of course, both the law and swallowing dust, if anything ...

The law is good. But this is in France, for example. And if the whole system in the country works in this paradigm - "one's own or not one's", including the application of the law, then all this bacchanalia with the mediocre theatrical arrest of a prominent director personally causes me, in addition to natural disgust and indignation, the desire to blatantly plagiarize the classic I do not like revolutionary revolt comrade. Lenin the title of one of his schizophrenic scribbles - about Leo Tolstoy as a mirror of the Russian revolution. Only by replacing the name of Lev Nikolaevich with another talented Russian - Kirill Semyonovich - it turns out that in the ending it is no longer a revolution, but this very thing - a collapse. However, it is also a natural result.

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The Basmanny Court of Moscow sent the artistic director of the Gogol Center, Kirill Serebrennikov, accused of major fraud, under house arrest until October 19, a BBC Russian Service correspondent reports from the courtroom.

Thus, the court granted the petition of the investigation and agreed with the arguments that Serebrennikov could put pressure on the witnesses.

The director will serve the house arrest in his apartment on Prechistenka. Serebrennikov will be able to visit the theater with the written permission of the investigator.

The director's defense plans to appeal the court's decision. "We have three days to appeal, we will definitely do it," Serebrennikov's lawyer Dmitry Kharitonov said.

When Judge Elena Lenskaya announced the decision, the people gathered outside the courthouse chanted: "Shame!"

Russian Minister of Culture Vladimir Medinsky commented on the court's decision more restrained. "There is no political or economic order," he told reporters, citing "his sources."

When asked by the BBC if the minister or his subordinates were summoned for interrogation, Medinsky replied: “I’m not there. They called colleagues from the relevant department. This is Andrei Malyshev’s department, which was engaged in paperwork for Serebrennikov. They asked: is your signature, not yours? But all of this [allocation of grants to Serebrennikov] was under the previous leadership of the department, Sofya Apfelbaum was there. Now the investigating authorities have no questions to the Ministry of Culture."

How was the meeting

At the beginning of the meeting, Kharitonov handed over to the court a list of those who vouched for Serebrennikov. Among them are singer Philip Kirkorov, TV presenter Andrei Malakhov, director of the Bolshoi Theater Vladimir Urin, director Fyodor Bondarchuk, director Tretyakov Gallery Zelfira Tregulova, writer Lyudmila Ulitskaya and others.

There were no close relatives of Serebrennikov in the hall, however, at his request, his acquaintances and actors of the Gogol Center were allowed to attend the meeting: Victoria Isakova, journalist Ksenia Larina, directors Andrei Smirnov and Alexei Mizgirev.

The investigator, speaking in court, stated that Serebrennikov's guilt was confirmed by the testimony of the former director of the Seventh Studio, Yuri Itin, and accountant Nina Maslyaeva. In addition, the investigator pointed out, the director expressed his intention to go abroad, he has a residence permit in Latvia.

The prosecutor agreed that the suspicions against Serebrennikov were justified, and the materials of the case showed that a crime had been committed.

The lawyer insisted that the investigation's petition was unfounded. The defense asked the court to consider allowing Serebrennikov to visit the theater and filming. The defense also offered to make a bail, which is equivalent to the amount of damage allegedly caused by Serebrennikov.

Bail volunteered to pay Chief Editor magazine "New Literary Review" Irina Prokhorova.

"I am 100% sure that Kirill has nothing to do with the crime. I am ready to post bail in order to great person I didn’t sit in a pre-trial detention center so that there was no feeling like in the old dark times, when talented people died instead of working," she said, speaking in court.

Serebrennikov himself said that he was not guilty and asked the court to release him.

"I would like to be released, because I am not guilty. The accusations seem absurd and impossible. I have been honestly working in Russia for many years, making performances, making films. I am in this moment I'm making a film, it needs to be finished, - said Serebrennikov, - I have no motivation to run away. At the investigation stage, I did not run away and did not try to hide. On any call, I came for interrogation. He cooperated with the investigation, told the whole truth, which is that there was a project "Platform", the money allocated by the state was spent on it. I'm proud of him."

Action near the court

The night before, Serebrennikov's friends, including artists and journalists, called on social networks to take part in the action at the Basmanny Court. The press secretary of the Gogol Center, Daria Alenina, also wrote about the need to support the director on her Facebook.

The beginning of the meeting on choosing a preventive measure for Serebrennikov was scheduled for 12:00. Around 11:30, people began to gather at the court. Among them are TV presenter Leonid Parfyonov, journalists Elena Chekalova and Sergey Parkhomenko, director Boris Khlebnikov, editor-in-chief Russian version magazine Hello! Svetlana Bondarchuk.

Parfyonov told the BBC Russian Service that six months ago Serebrennikov's arrest was unimaginable. “Now, it turns out, it is possible. We will live on with this experience,” he said.

Bondarchuk, when asked by a BBC correspondent, replied that she did not delve into the legal details of the case, but the form it took "makes one wonder if it is political."

The police asked the crowd to get off the road. Paddy wagons drove up to the courthouse.

Around the same time, when Serebrennikov's supporters gathered, the director himself was taken to court. The Dozhd TV channel showed how bailiffs in masks led the director into the courtroom, while pushing him.

In the hall, Serebrennikov was placed in a cage for detainees.

From witness to accused

On the night of August 22, Serebrennikov was detained in St. Petersburg and taken to the Investigative Committee in Moscow, where he was charged with fraud in particular large size.

The investigation believes that Serebrennikov organized the theft of 68 million rubles allocated in 2011-2014 by the Ministry of Culture for the implementation of the Platform project. Serebrennikov's non-profit organization Seventh Studio received budget money.

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As stated in the UK, the director was interrogated as an accused, but did not admit guilt. He spent the night in the temporary detention center on Petrovka.

In the detention center, Serebrennikov was visited by human rights activists, to whom the director said that he was amazed at the accusation against him. Earlier, Serebrennikov was a witness in the case of fraud with budget money.

At the end of May, within the framework of this case, the former general director of the Seventh Studio, Yuri Itin, and the former chief accountant of the organization, Nina Maslyaeva, were arrested. In June, the court also arrested the ex-director of the Gogol Center Alexei Malobrodsky.

According to investigators, they “every year from 2011 to 2014 developed action plans within the framework of the Platforma project, containing deliberately unreliable inflated information about their number and cost, after which they submitted these plans to the Russian Ministry of Culture as a justification for the amount of the required budget funding".

On Tuesday, August 22, the UK announced that another defendant appeared in the case - the executive producer of the play "A Midsummer Night's Dream" Ekaterina Voronova. She has been put on the wanted list.

Kirill Serebrennikov is one of the most famous theater directors in Russia, winner of numerous awards, including the Golden Mask for the play "Thugs" staged by Seventh Studio in 2012.

Who vouched for Serebrennikov:

Philip Kirkorov, singer

Andrey Malakhov, TV presenter

Alexander Kalyagin, ChairmanWITHunion of theatrical figures

Vladimir Urin, director of the Bolshoi Theater

Evgeny Mironov, head of the Theater of Nations

Fyodor Bondarchuk, director

Konstantin Raikin, theater director" Satyricon"

Danila Kozlovsky, actor

Nyuta Federmesser, President of the Charitable Foundation" Faith"

Avdotya Smirnova, TV presenter

Igor Vernik, actor

Valery Garkalin, actor

Victoria Isakova, actress

Elizaveta Boyarskaya, actress

Chulpan Khamatova, actress

Nikolai Kartozia, president of the TV holding" Profmedia"

Zelfira Tregulova, director of the Tretyakov Gallery

Alexei German, director

Ludmila Ulitskaya, writer

Ksenia Rappoport, actress

Semyon Slepakov, producer

Lev Dodin, director

Ivan Urgant, TV presenter

Ksenia Sobchak, TV presenter

Maxim Vitorgan, actor

Alexey Mizgirev, director

Konstantin Khabensky, actor

Nikolay Svanidze, journalist

Andrey Smirnov, director

On August 22, 2017, Russian director Kirill Serebrennikov was detained on suspicion of fraud.

According to the Investigative Committee, the department has not yet applied to the court with a request for arrest. He should be charged soon. According to investigators, in 2011-2014 the director organized the theft of "at least 68 million rubles" allocated for his theatrical project "Platform".

At the same time, it is already known that the case against Serebrennikov was initiated under part 4 of article 159 (fraud on an especially large scale), which involves up to ten years in prison. According to press sources, Serebrennikov may be placed in a pre-trial detention center or placed under house arrest.

Today, the Russian press, citing sources in the UK, writes that “in the case, there are, among other things, testimonies not only from Maslyaeva, but also from other persons. The investigation has collected enough grounds for his [Serebrennikov's] status to change from a witness to a suspect.”

Testimony in a criminal case against director Kirill Serebrennikov was given by several employees of the accounting department of his theater company Seventh Studio. This was reported by Interfax with reference to an unnamed source.

The interlocutor of the agency said that not only the arrested former chief accountant of the company Nina Maslyayeva gave testimony, but also an employee of the accounting department Tatyana Zhirikova and "other persons"

Before that, the director gave the law enforcement officers a passport. Recently Serebrennikov's house and the Gogol Center were searched. Serebrennikov then took part in the case as a witness, the investigators released him after interrogation.

Recall that on May 24, Putin clearly said that the searches at Serebrennikov's were carried out by "fools." Later, on June 15, on the Direct Line, Putin once again stated that it was “absurd” to conduct searches with force support in the theater.

Recall that in early August, the former accountant of the Seventh Studio, Nina Maslyaeva, who was detained earlier, said that Serebrennikov, together with Alexei Malobrodsky and Yuri Itin, created this theater company to “implement criminal intent” to embezzle allocated budget funds.

As a result of this investigation, the prosecution against the defendants in the criminal case, according to a new assessment, the damage amounted to 68 million rubles. Earlier it was about the amount of 3.5 million rubles. One of them concerned the fact that the Seventh Studio allegedly received money for the performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream, but did not stage it. At the same time, the production was on the "Platform" and in the "Gogol Center" headed by Serebrennikov.

The investigation intends to charge Kirill Serebrennikov with committing the specified crime, as well as to resolve the issue of choosing a measure of restraint.

In addition, the media said that the companies of the infamous artistic director received state contracts in his own theater for 4.8 million rubles.

"The investigation found an apartment in Germany with Kirill Serebrennikov. According to the telegram channel Mash, the real estate in Berlin cost the Russian director 300 thousand euros. The apartment was bought on May 9, 2012, when the Ministry of Culture was financing the Seventh Studio," the journalists said.

“We also managed to establish schemes for withdrawing budget money under fictitious contracts for the provision of services. Judging by the documents, Seventh Studio purchased paper, gift sets, alcohol, but the contracts turned out to be leftist, no services were received. "garbage heaps". Now the investigation finds out what exactly the withdrawn money went for, "they added.

As Nina Maslyaeva, an accountant at the Gogol Center, who is suspected of fraud, explained that she, on the orders of Itin, Serebrennikov and Malobrodsky, “entered false data into the financial statements.”

Recall that the case itself regarding the embezzlement of public funds in the Gogol Center started in May 2017. The searches in the theater attracted the attention of the public and the media, and for the liberal cultural intelligentsia was truly a shock, followed by loud protests and accusations of harassment.

In fact, there is a qualitatively new scheme. It is necessary to create some kind of organization that nominally should be engaged in cultural education and for this business to draw funds from the state. But adjust the corresponding reporting for this.

Serebrennikov and company did not. It is worth recalling that claims against him arose before 2014. The police came to him about the play "Thugs" and the compliance of this performance with the legislation of the Russian Federation in terms of public morality and morality in 2013.

Later, the director was indignant about the "censorship", the fact that "there is not enough air" and agitated everyone to leave the implacable opposition. Now in the telegram they write that "we expect new wave, even a tsunami of excuses, explanations, hand-wringing, open letters, "breaking down", as well as giggling propaganda "this one cuts his wife, that one wrings out phones, the third daughter takes off her naked, and these steal." However, we have already seen all this from Belykh. But he sits, a tramp."

The authors of the Mash channel write that “Kirill Serebrennikov is not doing well. In 2014, our artistic director with his ANO Seventh Studio signed an agreement with the Ministry of Culture and received subsidies from them for 66 and a half million rubles. With this money, it was only necessary to promote culture to the masses, namely to the regions of Russia.Seventh Studio in the same year signed several contracts for almost 2 million.

Guess the culture was eventually promoted to the masses? We can give you a hint: we still eat pancakes from a shovel, and Serebrennikov is threatened with a written undertaking not to leave the country or even worse.

According to the channel, "the firm of ANO Seventh Studio, whose leadership is suspected of embezzling money from the Ministry of Culture, is registered in the apartment of Kirill Serebrennikov himself."

Of course, not without reason. There have already been facts that tenders at the Serebrennikov cinema were won by ... companies whose founder was Serebrennikov. Such data can be obtained from the Spark-Interfax database. The same ANO "Seventh Studio" and the fund "Territory", the founder of which is Kirill Semenovich, as well as IP Serebrennikov K.S. (OGRNIP 307770000588280), created by the full namesake of our hero over the past five years, won tenders worth almost five million rubles from the theater, which he himself manages.

And then to say, little things. Thus, in the theater under the direction of Kirill Serebrennikov, a number of tenders in the amount of 4.8 million rubles. won by legal entities (including IP Serebrennikov K.S.), whose founder is Kirill Serebrennikov.

Being in the public service, Kirill Serebrennikov continued to engage in commercial activities (including winning tenders from his own theater through the IP Serebrennikov K.S.).

At the same time, a lot of good and right things are happening in the Gogol Center, for example, a toothbrush is bought for 1399 rubles for the play "Martyr". Comments, as they say, are superfluous.

ALL PHOTOS

The Basmanny Court ruled on a preventive measure for the director and head of the Gogol Center theater Kirill Serebrennikov, accused of fraud for 68 million rubles. He was sent under house arrest for almost two months - until October 19, RBC reports. The decision to place him under house arrest will be appealed.

Under house arrest, Serebrennikov is prohibited by the court from communicating with the press, using the Internet and sending mail - these are standard restrictions. The court refused to grant the director's defense request for permission to visit theater work in Moscow and filming in St. Petersburg. "The issue of allowing Serebrennikov to leave the apartment is left to the discretion of the investigator," TASS quoted Judge Elena Lenskaya as saying. Also, an electronic bracelet will be put on the person involved in the case.

Serebrennikov's defense intends to appeal the decision of the Basmanny Court to place him under house arrest, RIA Novosti reports. "Within three days we will file a complaint," said Dmitry Kharitonov, the director's lawyer.

Serebrennikov's defense asked the court to release the accused, it was proposed to release him on bail equal to the damage that, according to the investigation, he caused (that is, almost 70 million rubles). Publisher Irina Prokhorova said she was ready to contribute any amount that the court would appoint.

Having learned the decision of the court, the crowd that had gathered earlier outside the building began to shout "Shame". About two dozen people sang "Changes" by Viktor Tsoi, reports "Mediazona" (recall that due to house arrest, Serebrennikov will not be able to continue shooting the film "Summer" about the legendary rock singer).

Before the meeting, a lot of people came to support the artist, among whom were directors Boris Khlebnikov, Andrey Smirnov and Vladimir Mirzoev, TV presenter Leonid Parfyonov, founder of the Dynasty Foundation Dmitry Zimin, writer Lyudmila Ulitskaya, editor-in-chief of the New Literary Review Irina Prokhorova, journalist and husband of Dmitry Medvedev's press secretary Natalya Timakova Alexander Budberg, Mikhail Dvorkovich (brother of Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich), journalist Sergei Parkhomenko, publicist Viktor Shenderovich, actors Alisa Khazanova, Svetlana Bondarchuk, Yuri Kolokolnikov and Alexander Pal.

During the consideration of the issue of a measure of restraint, people, standing on the street, tried to support Serebrennikov. They chanted the director's name and applauded for several minutes, as usually happens at the end of theatrical performances. The windows were open in the courtroom, the applause and whistling could be heard very clearly from the street.

In addition, many tried to convince the court of the honesty of the accused. famous people and fellow directors. The guarantors in his case were: the widow of the famous writer Natalya Solzhenitsyna, singer Philip Kirkorov, TV presenters Ksenia Sobchak, Nikolai Svanidze, Andrey Malakhov and Ivan Urgant, directors Alexander Kalyagin, Alexei Mizgirev, Fyodor Bondarchuk and Konstantin Raikin, actors Yevgeny Mironov, Maxim Vitorgan, Semyon Slepakov and Chulpan Khamatova, writer Lyudmila Ulitskaya, screenwriter Avdotya Smirnova, director of the Tretyakov Gallery Zelfira Tregulova.

Kirill Serebrennikov has been charged with large-scale fraud. After the first interrogation of Serebrennikov as a defendant, his lawyer Dmitry Kharitonov told reporters that the client does not admit his guilt and denies any involvement in the theft.

According to investigators, in 2011 Serebrennikov came up with and developed a project for the development and popularization of contemporary art "Platform", for the implementation and financing of which in 2011-2014 the Ministry of Culture allocated more than 214 million rubles from the federal budget. To implement the project, the ANO "Seventh Studio" was created, in which he involved Yuri Itin, Alexei Malobrodsky, Ekaterina Voronova, Nina Maslyaeva and others.

It is assumed that they developed action plans containing deliberately inflated information about their number and cost, and also prepared and submitted financial and creative reports to the Ministry of Culture, indicating that the subsidy received by Seventh Studio was spent in full.

"Also, Serebrennikov instructed the above persons to ensure that Seventh Studio concludes fictitious contracts with controlled legal entities and private entrepreneurs who allegedly fulfilled their obligations related to the implementation of the activities envisaged by the Platform project, the UK insists.

Under the guise of payment for these contracts, received from the Ministry of Culture cash of the federal budget were withdrawn to the settlement accounts of counterparties (some were so-called one-day firms), cashed out and distributed by Serebrennikov among the accomplices.

Currently, Malobrodsky and Maslyaeva remain in custody, who pleaded guilty by entering into an agreement on cooperation with the investigation. Itin is under house arrest. Itin and Malobrodsky deny their guilt. The ex-producer of the "Seventh Studio" Voronova was put on the wanted list.

According to him, the director had an intention to leave the territory of the Russian Federation in the near future. This was possible thanks to a residence permit in the Republic of Latvia and an apartment in Berlin, the representative of the TFR believes. Witnesses in the case are former subordinates of the director. According to the investigation, he can influence them, "including threatening them." Thus, the daughters of the accountant Maslyayeva have already been subjected to surveillance and pressure from Serebrennikov's subordinates, the investigator claims.

“The amount of theft in the case will increase. At present, we have not yet completed all the examinations, ”said a member of the investigation team.

Lawyer Dmitry Kharitonov at the beginning of the meeting asked the court to attach to the case file personal guarantees for Serebrennikov, signed by the director of the Alexander Solzhenitsyn Foundation Natalya Solzhenitsyna, the director of the Tretyakov Gallery Zelfira Tregulova, the general director of the Bolshoi Theater Vladimir Urin, the head of the Vera Foundation Nyuta Federmesser, the singer Philip Kirkorov and many other public and cultural figures.

The remark of the investigation that Serebrennikov refused to testify is not entirely correct, the lawyer said. “He was detained early in the morning in St. Petersburg and was taken to Moscow for eight hours. When at 14:00 I arrived at the Investigative Committee and the interrogation began, Serebrennikov said only that he had neither moral nor physical strength to read and understand the multi-page accusation,” Kharitonov said and added that, according to Serebrennikov, the accusation was “incomprehensible” to him. From the new accusation that the central office of the ICR brought against the defendants in the case at the end of July, the mention of the play "A Midsummer Night's Dream" disappeared, the lawyer said. Earlier, the version of the investigation was that the "Seventh Studio" stole money for the performance and it was not staged. Now, the mechanism of theft is not specified in any way: "It is impossible to defend yourself against such an accusation."

“I would like, of course, to be released, because it’s not my fault. The charges brought against me seem incredible, absurd, impossible,” Serebrennikov told the court. - I have no intention of running away: I came to any call and told the whole truth - that the Platform project was, the budget money was spent only on it, and I am very proud of it. All the people involved in it worked in good faith.” According to the director, he "never suspected or blamed" the employees of the Seventh Studio, who were responsible for the economy.

The accused confirmed that he asked the investigation to return the confiscated passport, since he had to go to Germany to stage an opera in Stuttgart. “It concerned only my contractual obligations. I had no intention of hiding," he added.

Serebrennikov's defense is ready to make a bail for him corresponding to the amount of damage in the case - 68 million rubles, said Kharitonov's lawyer. “It is clear that we personally do not have that kind of money. But I think that if we go outside now, we will quickly collect them, ”the defender specified. At his request, the directors Andrei Smirnov and Alexei Mizgirev, as well as the publisher Irina Prokhorova, were interrogated at the trial, who spoke about Serebrennikov's personality.

Kirill Serebrennikov (Photo: Anton Kardashov / Moscow Agency)

“This case, in my opinion, is absolutely exaggerated. And what the investigator said here does not characterize Serebrennikov, but the work of our Investigative Committee, exclaimed Smirnov. — I have no reason to doubt Serebrennikov's professional honesty. In general, to see him behind bars and the fact that they brought him here in handcuffs is outrageous.” According to him, just a list of cultural figures who vouched for the director is "enough to understand where the truth and goodness are."

"He leads enough humble life, which is subordinated to one cause - his work. I know Kirill as a very honest person; I myself staged a performance at the Gogol Center and I know that the work there is built on full inclusion - emotional, creative. Apart from work, nothing else exists for people there,” Mizgirev said.

“From my point of view, Serebrennikov is an outstanding director and theater figure. And he is, this is an indisputable fact, the pride of our country. His project made Russia an advanced theatrical power. I can say that this is a crystal-clearly honest person whose goal in life is creativity. Pardon the pun, but he's an absolute disgrace. And I am ready to make any bail so that a really great person does not sit in jail, ”summed up Prokhorova.

The meeting was held to the sound of applause and shouts from Kalanchevskaya Street - hundreds of his supporters came to the courthouse to support the director.

Detention of Serebrennikov

The director early in the morning of August 22 in a St. Petersburg hotel, he was in the city on the set of his film about Viktor Tsoi. Serebrennikov was taken to Moscow, where, following an interrogation in the central office of the Investigative Committee, he was charged with organizing fraud.

According to the investigation, in 2011, Serebrennikov came up with and developed a project for the development and popularization of contemporary art "Platform", for which in 2011-2014 the Ministry of Culture allocated more than 214 million rubles. To implement the project, the director created ANO "Seventh Studio". Employees of the company provided the Ministry of Culture with “action plans within the framework of the Platform project, containing deliberately unreliable, inflated information about their number and cost”, made false reports, as well as fictitious contracts for work that was not actually carried out, according to the TFR. The defendants of the case transferred the budgetary compensations for these works to the accounts of one-day firms and cashed them out, and then Serebrennikov distributed them among the participants in the scheme, the investigators are convinced.

The Case of the Seventh Studio

The case of fraud with the state subsidy of the Seventh Studio company was initiated back in 2015, but it became known only after, at Serebrennikov’s house and at several other addresses. Earlier, the TFR filed charges against Seventh Studio accountant Nina Maslyayeva, former director of Gogol Center Alexei Malobrodsky, and ex-general director of Seventh Studio Yuri Itin.

Serebrennikov until recently remained in the status of a witness, along with several other employees of the company, as well as with the former head of the state support department of the Ministry of Culture, Sofia Apfelbaum. The country's leadership decided to abandon his criminal prosecution, citing sources close to officials and the director himself. However, after searches and interrogation in May, Serebrennikov's passport was confiscated, he himself told the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung.

In early August, it became known that Maslyaeva. According to the protocol of her interrogation, Itin, Serebrennikov and Malobrodsky created the ANO "Seventh Studio" "for the implementation of criminal intent." The accountant helped them cash out a subsidy from the state; The defendants in the case disposed of the cash at their own discretion, Maslyaeva told the investigation. Earlier, she stated that since 2014, at least 100 million rubles have been withdrawn from the Seventh Studio account. in favor of one-day firms. Maslyaeva's daughters meanwhile, as they assumed, from Serebrennikov's former colleagues and associates.

Initially, individual defendants in the case were charged with fraud for smaller amounts: they were accused of embezzling 2.3 million rubles allocated for the production of the play "A Midsummer Night's Dream", and that they, together with unidentified persons, prepared false reports on the work for 1, 2 million rubles, which in reality were not carried out.

At the end of June, the investigation of the case was entrusted to the central office of the ICR. On July 25, the defendants were charged with a new charge. In it, the essence of the act that the defendants are charged with is not specified, Ksenia Karpinskaya, Malobrodsky's lawyer, explained to journalists. “It just says that they worked at the Seventh Studio and spent public money. How exactly is not specified, ”said the defender.