How It All Began: The Story of Voices Archive

HISTORY

Welcome to Voices Archive — a unique cultural project dedicated to preserving the resonant history of our generation. I'm Artemy Zhigulev, a molecular biologist and contemporary art historian. My passion for alternative culture and archival work inspired me to create this platform and develop it into the resource you see today.

PAST

Voices Archive traces its roots to the Tula Street Voices (TSV) project. I launched TSV in 2017 to support the first wave of Eastern European internet poets by organizing their concerts in my hometown of Tula. In the early 2010s, this scene had a strong DIY spirit: books printed at parents' workplaces and concerts held in living rooms or anti-cafés. Tours often relied on the dedication of local enthusiasts.

TSV quickly grew into a team of five, and over three formative years, we hosted a wide range of artists including Serafima Ananasova, Evgeny Soya, Dima Ptitsami, Lev Rubinstein, Andrey Orlovsky, Vladimir Tok, Maxim Tesli, and EPP. Along the way, I began collecting materials gifted by the artists — recordings, books, drawings, and handwritings — much of it still unpublished or undocumented online. I soon realized that preserving these artifacts would be essential to maintaining our shared cultural memory.

Group photo of Tula Street Voices at a poetry reading, capturing the energy of the underground literary scene and spoken word movement, featured in Voices Archive by Artemy Zhigulev.

Photo: Baraban

FUTURE

Today, my archival interests focus on the evolution of text-centric art — from the establishment of Russia's first independent music club, TamTam, in 1991, to the rise of the Eastern European internet poetry movement in 2013, and the ongoing global influence of alternative rap and post-punk. At the same time, I continue to document other artists whose work captures the spirit of our time.

This online archive is just the first step toward creating a physical space for preserving, studying and sharing our culture. It will take time, energy, and resources to bring this vision to life. But with the support of artists and visitors like you — the true voices of our generation, I feel confident it will become a reality.

Thanks for staying with us.