Pavel Kushnir

Pavel Mikhailovich Kushnir (, 19 September 1984 – 27 July 2024) was a Russian pianist, writer, and political activist, who became the first political prisoner in modern Russia to die during a hunger strike. Born into a musical family in Tambov, Kushnir displayed exceptional talent as a pianist from an early age, performing at 17 the complete cycle of 24 Preludes and Fugues by Shostakovich. After graduating from the Moscow Conservatory in 2007, he worked as a pianist and accompanist in various Russian cities, eventually becoming a soloist with the in 2023.

Kushnir engaged in civil activism, participating in protests against the annexation of Crimea and the war in Ukraine, and had a small YouTube channel where he criticized the Russian government. He was arrested in 2024 for his videos and accused of making public calls for terrorist activity. Kushnir died on 27 July 2024, in a detention center in Birobidzhan during a dry hunger strike. His death sparked interest in his performances and books.

Biography

Early years

Pavel Kushnir was born in Tambov on 19 September 1984, in a Jewish family. His father, Mikhail Borisovich Kushnir (1945–2020), was a musician and a teacher at a children's music school, who developed his own method of teaching music to children, widely used in music schools in Russia. His mother, Irina Mikhailovna Levina (born 1944), was a music teacher. His paternal grandfather was a singing teacher and a choral conductor, his grandmother was an accompanist. A child prodigy, Pavel started to play piano at two, and then studied at a music school in Tambov. At the age of 17, Kushnir performed the complete cycle of 24 Preludes and Fugues by Dmitry Shostakovich.

In 2002, he graduated from the and entered the Moscow Conservatory, studying under the People's Artist of the USSR, Victor Merzhanov. He graduated from the conservatory in 2007.

Kushnir wanted to continue his studies in the conservatory, but refused to play a piece from a Schumann Phantasy during the entrance exam, because "it would ruin his interpretation of the performance". He moved to Yekaterinburg and enrolled to the aspiranture of the Urals Mussorgsky State Conservatoire. According to a friend, he was on a "different level", and had conflicts with some people on the faculty. After two years of studies, he was falsely accused of theft, and left the Conservatoire.

Career as a pianist

Kushnir worked as an accompanist at . After graduating from the conservatory, he moved to Yekaterinburg for two years, then worked for seven years in Kursk and three years in Kurgan. In 2023, he became a soloist with the by invitation from the philharmonia director.

Kushnir made very few recordings. He recorded the cycle of 24 preludes by Sergei Rachmaninoff. Musicologist Mikhail Kazinik praised this performance, noting that "he demonstrated the development of Rachmaninoff's ideas, and he purified it from all overlays, from any pop stylings — he made it crystal clear". For the radio station, Kushnir recorded a cycle "Mazurkas on Wednesdays", for which he performed and analyzed 51 out of 58 Chopin's Mazurkas.

Activism and performances

While studying at the conservatory, Kushnir "cultivated the image of a dissident"; his friend described him as wearing "a shabby beige overcoat with a bulging pocket. Under the coat he was always dressed in black, and a half-liter bottle of vodka often stuck out of his pocket." He had a nickname, "Hasid".

Pavel Kushnir was involved in civil activism. In 2010, together with a friend he "protested against the heat, walking around the city in winter clothes in 40-degree heat". For a poetic event, he wrote poems in the constructed language Naʼvi from the movie ''Avatar''. He participated in the protests at Bolotnaya Square in 2011–2013, pickets against the war in Donbass and the annexation of Crimea in 2014, and distributed anti-war leaflets in Kursk and Birobidzhan, after the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine began. In 2022 and 2023, he held anti-war hunger strikes, firstly one for twenty days, and then for a hundred.

Kushnir was fired from the Birobidzhan Philarmonia because of his political activism.

Arrest and death

Kushnir had a YouTube channel, named "Foreign agent Mulder", with only five subscribers and four videos. The channel was named after the FBI agent Fox Mulder, from Kushnir's favourite TV series, ''The X-Files'', and Russian foreign agent law. He was arrested by FSB for these videos, in which he called Putin's Russia a "fascist state" and the Bucha massacre "a disgrace to our homeland". Kushnir was accused under "the article on public calls for terrorist activity". His case was unknown to human rights activists. He died on 27 July, on the fifth day of a dry hunger strike. He became the first political prisoner in modern Russia to die of a hunger strike.

His friends think that he was beaten in jail, but his mother insisted on a cremation without further investigation. Pavel and his mother and brother had opposing views regarding the war and Russian politics. A few years prior he and his brother had a fight; he then had no contact with the family for two years. There were eleven people at the ceremony in Birobidzhan; his body was then sent to a crematorium in Khabarovsk. His mother and brother did not attend the farewell.

Legacy and publications

Kushnir was almost unknown during his life. He did not seek fame as a musician, and made very few recordings. He believed that the arts should be free to the audience, and refused to advertise himself. He preferred smaller cities, and wanted to stay in Birobidzhan for twelve years, if "not imprisoned, drafted into the army, or fired". He thought that he had more freedom outside of the capital, and hoped that there he could avoid playing at state pro-war concerts. After his death, his friends started writing about his overlooked genius.

His first book, ''Russian cut-up'' (), was published in 2014 as print-on-demand by small German publisher Za-Za Verlag, and was completely unnoticed. Made in the cut-up technique, the book consists of Kushnir's diary and pieces of multiple World War II novels. The book was written as an anti-war manifesto after the 2014 war on Donbas; Kushnir compared it to the "advent of a giant hog". The book was published in paperback shortly after his death.

In 2022, he finished his second book, ''Noel'', and described it in an interview:

The book is unpublished, and the location of the draft is unknown as of August 2024. He sent a draft of another book, ''The Birobidzhan Diary'', to a friend before the arrest. The ''Diary'' was published in 2025; in it Kushnir again used the cut-up method using Emmanuil Kazakevich's short story "Zvezda" ("The Star"). Kazakevich was a Soviet Jewish writer, who spent 1930s in Birobidzhan; ''Zvezda'' was published in 1947.

Kushnir wrote the ''Diary'' in September-December 2022; it consists of three parts:

The book was edited by writer and publisher , and includes Kushnir's letters, transcripts from Kushnir's YouTube channel, and a long preface by Volchek.

Kushnir wrote several other books, also unpublished: a novel ''Kosyag and Begemod'' (Косяг и Бегемод) and a story ''Dust'' (Пыль). A book of Kishnir's commentaries on Chopin's ''Mazurkas'' is being prepared for publication.

In 2024, a scholarship named after Kushnir was created in Israel. The scholarship is intended for young musicians from Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine who had to move abroad because of the war. A series of concerts in memory of Kushnir was played in European cities. The first concert in Israel was played in Tel Aviv on December 25, 2024, by pianists Oxana Yablonskaya, , and Adam Hen-Adamov. They performed Chopin's ''Mazurkas'', with Kushnir's commentaries read before the performance, and Nirvana's songs.

In 2025, "Rachmaninoff. Preludes", played by Kushnir in 2010, was remastered and released. It is Kushnir's only released music.

Bibliography

* Pavel Kushnir (2017)
Uwe Lausen, Life and Art
(in Russian)
*
**
*

Notes

References

External links

Kushnir's YouTube channel, "Inoagent Mulder"

Pavel Kushnir playlist on YouTube

24 Preludes by Rachmaninoff
*

All "Mazurkas on Wednesdays" on YouTube

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kushnir, Pavel
1984 births
2024 deaths
20th-century Russian pianists
21st-century Russian male writers
21st-century Russian pianists
People from Tambov
People who died on hunger strike
Russian anti-war activists
Russian male classical pianists
Russian political prisoners
Moscow Conservatory alumni