Lorak and Serdiuchka blacklisted in Russia? 

Social media and online outlets are actively discussing the issue that some Ukrainian stars, such as Verka Serdiuchka, Anastasia Prikhodko, Svitlana Loboda, Ivan Dorn and Ani Lorak, had been banned from performing at corporate parties in Russia. Some media even claim that these performers were added to a black list of sorts. A popular quote about these Ukrainian stars was published in the Russian edition of Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper: the heads of Russian companies consider them “artists with a contradicting ideology.” Many media, having reprinted this, cite Komsomolskaya Pravda, which quotes the website of a civil organization – The National Association of Event Organizers (NAOZ) in Russia, which is the primary source. However, there is nothing about any sort of ban or black list on the official website of this organization. “NAOZ prepared a rating of stars who are taboo. The list is headed by Ani Lorak, Svitlana Loboda, Andriy Danylko (Verka Serdiuchka), Ivan Dorn and Anastasia Prikhodko, all of whom are from Ukraine. While before there was a high demand for artists from Ukraine, this year there is no demand for them from even large companies,” says the NAOZ. This is how executive director of the NAOZ Vladislav Metreveli commented on the situation: “Izvestiya newspaper asked us to provide data about the Ukrainian artists who had been invited to corporate parties in Russia. We surveyed the members of our association and found out that none of the Ukrainian stars had been invited, unfortunately. This may not be a matter of politics, not as much as economics. Because everyone is tightening their belts in relation to the budget and it would be more costly to invite, say, an artist and pay for their trip, then take someone from Moscow. Some of the performers are being successfully replaced by doubles and parody artists, this is how Moscow-based event agencies position themselves, so to speak, they are somewhat decreasing the budget this year, but there is no black list…” However, Vladislav Metreveli does not exclude the possibility that there may be companies which do not want to invite someone in particular. “Those that are faithful to the policies of their state and government, but mostly, the reason lies in a number of factors, not only politics,” he noted. Metreveli also added that there are media outlets which had reprinted the article after distorting it or adding their own formulations to it. For example, he called the phrase “Serdiuchka, Dorn and even Lorak will not sing under the Russian fir-tree any more,” in Komsomolskaya Pravda “their own formulation.” “What is more, we already made contact with the editor of the website and asked to change some of the formulations, I don’t know what they will change and where,” he noted. Meanwhile, Russian TV channel NTV already announced that Ani Lorak would participate in its New Year’s concert.