In today's Russia, the only place where free speech can still be heard is in the cage of the courtroom. From here, the defendants make their last word, using this one opportunity to make their most important statements. To denounce war, to defy fear, to confront lies and violence, to support others. Last words are more than a political declaration, more than a testimony of personal courage. It is they that create the most poignant portrait of the era. Our collection, Unfollowed Words, is the voice of free people in an unfree country. "My inner freedom cannot be taken away by anyone. It lives in the word, it will live thanks to glasnost, when it will be read and heard by thousands of people. This freedom is already going on with every caring person who hears us in this country," Maria Alyokhina said at the Pussy Riot trial in 2012. - I believe that honesty and transparency and the thirst for the truth will make all of us a little bit freer. We will see that." And the more the space of freedom shrinks, the more precious and weighty every last word that breaks through the wall of silence. They are our medicine against fear, offering hope for healing.
