When Art Serves Peace

Supporting Local Talent and Shared Values

UA Florida, as a Palm Beach County-based nonprofit organization, would like to thank the Palm Beach Symphony for making the right decision to replace the Putin-supporting violinist with Valentin Mansurov.

Mr. Mansurov is a local Palm Beach County resident and is more than qualified to perform this music.  We fully support him and thank the Palm Beach Symphony for choosing a local resident with extensive experience in the South Florida symphony community to enrich the culture of Palm Beach County.

We would also like to highlight the concerns of the specific music that Mr. Repin was scheduled to perform.  He was scheduled to play Prokofiev’s second concerto.  Mr. Prokofiev was born and raised in Ukraine, in the Donetsk region.  Prokofiev is recognized in Ukraine as one of its greatest composers.

The Donetsk airport, the Philharmonic Hall, and the Donetsk Music academy were all named after him.  Unfortunately, we speak in the past tense, as all of those buildings and airfields have been destroyed in the constant bombing of Ukraine by Putin’s Russia.

UA Florida, as a Palm Beach County-based nonprofit organization, would like to thank the public, local Florida residents, the media, and Russian America for Democracy in Russia and Arts Against Aggression (find their letter here) for their strong support of this issue.  We also thank the Floridians who initially spoke out against the performance. (Find the article here.)

We encourage the Palm Beach Symphony and the Palm Beach Cultural Council to engage with us, so that we can add to the cultural diversity that we all enjoy in Palm Beach County

Again, we assert that culture should not be used to promote war or propaganda.