Artemy Troitsky entered Moscow State University in the early 1970s under Brezhnev, where he became notorious for hosting illicit discos from one of the university canteens. His professional career continued in the same vein, with underground assessments of the Beatles and Deep Purple in illegal samizdat journals. By the mid-‘80s, however, he had entered the mainstream as editor of the Soviet Union’s most influential music papers. Troitsky’s views grew increasingly important and, as a consequence, he was promoted to even more noteworthy publications as the USSR collapsed.

He famously worked at the Novaya Gazeta in the 1990s, the newspaper that regularly published the work of Anna Politkovskaya (tragically murdered in 2006). Disturbed and yet intrigued by the changing nature of modern Russian journalism, he even – with pronounced irony – accepted the position of editor at Playboy for a short while.

The end of socialism also meant the explosion of corporate TV, and here Troitsky’s influence grew beyond the printed page. He hosted the hugely significant media show “Programma A” that served to promote and explain a sudden diversity of culture(s) in the wake of state-controlled entertainment. Subsequent projects on other stations (NTV, 
Rossiia, and others) have served to keep him at the forefront of public attention today.

Co-sponsered with IHC, UCSB Russian Club, and the Departments of Germanic, Slavic, and Semitic Studies, Comparitive Literature, and Theater & Dance.