Perm-36. Otrazhenie

Perm-36 is the only Stalin-era camp to have been preserved in its entirety across the territory of the former Soviet Union. Tatyana Georgievna is the director of the museum, which was opened back in 1994. Since 2005 the museum has organized an annual two-day civil society gathering entitled “Pilorama”, which sees various civil society groups and former inmates come together in order to discuss political and social issues. The museum’s processing of the past is the source of great controversy however, with the state and various radical groupings applying pressure, as a result of which the museum has meanwhile been nationalized and the museum’s director dismissed. The director provides a poignant account of the camp, as former prisoners tell their tales; at the same time the viewer is provided with insight into contemporary Russian society and the state’s growing attempts to pressure its civilians into obedience. MM