Yuri Khashchevatsky

The New York Times has called him dictator Aleksandr Lukashenko's "artistic nemesis."  To the Belarusian authorities, he is public enemy number one, but Yuri Khashchevatsky prefers to think of himself as a "free spirit."  His dissident documentaries have earned him a concussion, broken bones, a six-month hospital stay, and a Jury Prize at the New York Film Festival for Human Rights. 
Many believe that Khashchevatsky would have been silenced years ago by the Belarusian State Security Committee (new KGB), were it not for his international acclaim and membership in Charter 97.  Inspired by the Czech Charter 77, Charter 97 is a pro-democracy organization of Belarusian artists and intellectuals.  Through its website and publications, Charter 97 gives voice to local critics of the Belarusian president who has famously been described as "Europe's last dictator."

Khashchevatsky's works have been featured and decorated in dozens of film festivals in Russia, Europe, and The United States.  Needless to say, his films are banned in Belarus.  An Ordinary President (Berlin International Film Festival 1997) is a scathing satire of Belarusian president Aleksandr Lukashenko, in which Khaschevatsky paints his subject as a Hitler-sympathizing despot. Yuri Khashchevatsky's persona non grata status with the Lukashenko regime only adds to his celebrity in Belarus and abroad, just like it would have in Soviet times.

In March 2006, Lukashenko won another rigged election, and thousands of Belarusian youth took part in a protest in Minsk's October Square.  A brutal police suppression and shameful looting of the protesters' property followed.  Khashchevatsky masterfully captured the startling events using hidden cameras.  Ploscha ('Square') (2007) became an underground phenomenon.  Using the power and anonymity of the Internet, tens of thousands of Belorusians have downloaded the artful documentary.

The visionary director has come a long way from his beginnings at the St Petersburg Film Academy, where he was influenced by the likes of Fellini, Bergman, and the Soviet director Mikhail Romm.  Today, Khashchevatsky's accolades include awards from film festivals in Kiev, St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Munich, San Francisco, Geneva, and New York.  The international film circuit has also recently brought him to Paris, Boston, Rome and Jerusalem.

His latest film In Search of Yiddish has been circulating throughout the United States among the Russian Jewish population.  Now, by popular demand, it will be available with English subtitles, and is coming to Boston and New York in December 2008