Russian composer faces deportation from Germany
NewsKerstin Holm, a culture editor at the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, has written an open letter to the federal government, calling on them to rescind plans to deport composer Vladimir Tarnopolsky back to Russia.
Tarnopolsky, 69, originally from Ukraine, left Moscow after the start of hostilities in March 2022. He has been composing and teaching in Germany ever since, but questions have been raised about the validity of his work permit. Officials have told him to return to Moscow and apply for a new visa. Were he to do so, he would certainly be arrested.
Kerstin Holm writes:
Vladimir Tarnopolsky has been deeply integrated into the artistic and social life of Germany for many years. He is a member of the Association of German Composers, a scholarship holder of the College of Sciences in Berlin, a member of the Saxon Academy of Arts, a laureate of the Paul Hindemith Composer’s Prize and other international awards. In 2023, he was awarded the Christoph and Stefan Kaske Foundation Prize.
Just four days after the attack on Ukraine began, Tarnopolsky gave an anti-war concert at the Boulez Hall in Berlin. During his two years in Germany, he wrote five large, passionately anti-war pieces of music, which were performed in the most famous concert halls of Munich (Prinzregenttentheater), Hamburg (Elbphilharmonie), Frankfurt (Alte Oper), Vienna (Konzerthaus), as well as in Berlin, Freiburg, Dresden, and in cities in Austria, Norway, Italy and America.
He took part in a series of conferences “Art and Responsibility” in several cities in Germany; at the invitation of the Munich and Dresden Music Academies, he led a series of seminars on composition.
Mr. Tarnopolsky is now faced with the option of returning to Russia to apply for another visa — where he and his family members face prosecution solely because of his anti-war sentiments — or seeking asylum with an uncertain outcome, which would leave him unable to create art, as he would be barred from employment and therefore unable to work as a musician.
Germany: take in over a million Syrians. Deport one Ukrainian composer. Make that make sense.
Because Germany lost to the Red Army in 1945. Not to Syria.
Aw, would you have preferred if Germany won? Next.
He is a Russian composer, at least by citizenship. If he were Ukrainian he would have gone back to Kiev to apply for another Visa.
It is you that should read more carefully. He is originally from Ukraine. Nice try.
Mr. Tarnopolsky is apprantly in germany on a work visa, which is granted for a limited time. He is certainly free to apply for political asylum at any time.
You’re definitely right! And he doesn’t want it. He hopes to return sometime I guess
German bureaucracy and illogic simply never disappoints – no trace of practical “get it done” mentality when necessary and so overly complicated and hesitant that you have no idea what you ever wanted – as a consequence a lot of measures are happily contradicting their fellow measures (I live there, the examples are countless and everywhere)!
“Just four days after the attack on Ukraine began, Tarnopolsky gave an anti-war concert at the Boulez Hall in Berlin.”
That was fast :/
Mo. Gergiev refused to make any statement against the war, he got kicked out from Germany.
Poor composer made a statememt against the war, he got kicked out from Germany too.
Making a statement or not is not important. What important is to remember Germany is not a country that welcomes foreigners, especially Russian.
There are more than 10.3 million foreigners in Germany, amounting to 12.5% of the population. Which is completely fine. By means of comparison, there are about 6.1 million in the UK (9.3%), 5.2 million in Spain (11.1%), 5.1 million in France (7.6%) and 5.0 million in Italy (8.5%). But don’t let the data from 2020 get in the way of your prejudice. BTW. at the end of 2022 that number had risen to 12.3 million in Germany, or 15% of the population. The third largest country of origin, after Turkey and Poland, is Russia.
As a Russian, you are screwed wherever you go and whatever you say, and certainly you can’t count on western countries to help you if you decide to throw the towel in and become a ‘dissident’. They’ll still sanction you simply because you had the audacity to be born in Russia.
If this poor man does manage to return safely to Russia to renew his visa, he will have to do so at enormous expense, through third countries, with cash in hand as there’s no way to transfer money, and he can’t buy a domestic train or plane ticket, or any other sanctioned goods while he is there or he could be prosecuted for breaking sanctions upon his return to Germany.
I don’t think it’s a certainly that he would be arrested in Russia, unless he has donated money to the Ukrainian army or called for armed overthrow of the Russian government. In spite of what you hear in the media, Russia is a very legalistic country, and people don’t just get locked up for being a bit dodgy or adding a Ukrainian flag to their Facebook profile.
The best he can do is keep his head down and look after himself, since no-one else will do that for him. As Kissinger said, ‘to be an enemy of the US is dangerous – to be a friend of the US is fatal.’
“ Just four days after the attack on Ukraine began, Tarnopolsky gave an anti-war concert at the Boulez Hall in Berlin. During his two years in Germany, he wrote five large, passionately anti-war pieces of music, which were performed in the most famous concert halls of Munich (Prinzregenttentheater), Hamburg (Elbphilharmonie), Frankfurt (Alte Oper), Vienna (Konzerthaus), as well as in Berlin, Freiburg, Dresden, and in cities in Austria, Norway, Italy and America.”
Seems to me that Mr. Tarnopolsky‘s public anti- war statements while abroad make him a strong dissident voice and Putin political hostage candidate.
The real question is where was he when Ukraine bombed Donbass for several years before Russia intervened ?