Funeral of Leonid Nikolaev

September 30 at 12:30 at the Ankudinovsky cemetery in the Moscow region will be buried Leonid Nikolaev - an activist of the art group "Voina".

He died in Domodedovo in an accident.

Nikolaev was born on December 27, 1983 in Moscow. Received a bachelor's degree from the Moscow Institute of Fine Chemical Technologies. In the second half of the 2000s, he joined the liberal opposition, was an activist in the We movement, was a member of the political council of the Moscow branch of Solidarity, and was repeatedly detained by the police.

Nikolaev participated in the actions of "War" from December 2009. In May 2010, against the backdrop of public dissatisfaction with bureaucratic privileges on the roads, he held a series of single actions on behalf of the group with a blue bucket on his head imitating a flashing light. The loudest of them was the action "Lenya Fucked - our president!" ("Lenya Fucked Protects the Feds"), which took place on May 22, 2010. Then Nikolaev ran with two blue buckets on his head along the hood of the FSO car at the Borovitsky Gates of the Kremlin. It was not possible to detain him on the spot. Later, the police detained the activist at his house and brought him to court, but the judge returned the case materials for revision to the police department.

Soon after that, Nikolaev, together with his colleagues in the War group, Leonid Vorotnikov (The Thief) and Natalya Sokol (Kozlenok), settled in St. Petersburg. Already on June 14, 2010, with the help of local activists, they carried out the loudest action of the "War" - "Dick is captured by the FSB" - by drawing a giant phallus on Liteiny Bridge, opposite the city headquarters of the special services, also known as the Big House. Nikolaev was detained and fined on charges of petty hooliganism.

On July 20, 2010, Nikolaev, together with the St. Petersburg artist Elena Kostyleva, held another action of the "War" - "Why did they fuck the chicken?" .

On September 16, 2010, "Voina" held an action "Palace coup" in St. Petersburg , during which several police cars were overturned.

On November 15, 2010, Nikolaev and Vorotnikov were detained in Moscow by CPE operatives. The activists were taken to St. Petersburg and arrested on November 17 on charges of hooliganism motivated by hatred or enmity (point "b" of part 1 of Article 213 of the Criminal Code, up to five years in prison). Both detainees refused to testify, referring to Article 51 of the Constitution.

On February 25, 2011, Nikolaev was released on bail ; on the same days, Vorotnikov was also released. In October 2011, the persecution of activists in the case was terminated, and in December of the same year, the case itself was closed. However, in February 2012, the investigation was resumed.

While Nikolaev and Vorotnikov were in jail, the action "Dick in captivity of the FSB" was included in the shortlist of the state art award "Innovation". April 8, 2011 "War" was announced as the winner of the award . The group began to spend the received 400 thousand rubles on targeted assistance to political prisoners.

Late in the evening of December 31, 2011, Nikolaev, together with his colleagues in the "War" , burned down a police paddy wagon parked in the courtyard of the St. Petersburg OP-71. In the War blog, the action was called "not artistic, but super-artistic." It was noted that it is dedicated to political prisoners.

The participants in the "War" emigrated to Italy, but later Nikolaev returned to Russia.