‘Earthlings, unite!’ street art comes under inspection for extremism
A wall painting featuring the slogan “Earthlings, unite!” and the image of a fist is being inspected by local authorities for signs of extremism in Russia’s far eastern city of Vladivostok.
The painting appeared on the brick wall of a building on July 15. According to the local news source VL.ru, a Vladivostok resident had filed a complaint about the image with the police. On August 18, construction workers painted over the image, on orders from the police.
The street art had been created by a local art studio called “Concrete Jungle.” Felix Mashkov, one of the founders of the studio, said that the painting was not a political call to action, but rather an artistic statement. He said the work had been inspired by NASA’s New Horizons Pluto mission. “We wanted to call people's attention in Vladivostok to this major event in an original way. People have to understand that, aside from their everyday problems, there are also greater goals for all of humankind; the study of outer space is one of them,” Mashkov told VL.ru.
Police have asked Mashkov to write up an official explanatory statement about the incident. Local authorities are currently analyzing the image and determining the artists’ motives.
“People have to be united by lofty aims of learning about the universe,” the authors of the project explained.
- In April 2015, police in the Russian city of Perm investigated another space-related graffiti image—a crucified Yuri Gagarin, the Soviet cosmonaut and first man in space. The artist was fined for vandalism.