Marija

The story of freedom

The Rebels were born in 2013 as artworks for Robert Kalinkin Fashion House upcoming fashion show in the largest arena in Lithuania which can accommodate up to 10,000 people. The concept and execution of those three artworks were by McCann Erickson, a branch of one of the largest advertising agencies in the world.

The concept was simple - to create a set of beautiful, serene visuals showcasing Robert Kalinkin Fashion House work and use phrases of everyday language to accentuate the relationship between fashion and everyday life.

Yet those artworks ignited a mega storm - one day before the fashion show we received instruction from the official government body to take down all the artworks everywhere - from outdoor ads to websites and all printed material.

Our ads were deemed as dangerous and hurting public morale by a handful of priests and therefore banned immediately by the officials. Worth mentioning that Lithuania is a secular country where the official government is strictly separated from religious matters. Lithuania also does not have an official religion.

Over the period of 2 years we lost all court cases in Lithuania, including the Supreme Court and were fined - the fine was insignificant, but to us, that was a matter of principle. We were pressured

to publicly apologise and say that we were consciously insulting religious symbols. Yet to us, this campaign was about beauty in daily life, freedom and creativity. And the expressions we used are so common in our daily language, that we still hear them every day.

We couldn’t just sit silent. So we decided to fight for our right to freedom of expression and brought this case to the European Court of Human Rights - the highest ranking institution for such matters in the EU. Fast forward 3 years and in 2018 the verdict came - Robert Kalinkin campaign did not violate public morale and we were punished illegally and without cause.

So essentially Robert Kalinkin won the case against our whole country and set precedent to all future rulings in the EU related to the matters of freedom of expression.

This was a monumental win for us and the whole artist community - a day of justice and a day to celebrate what we all believe in - freedom, creativity and beauty everywhere. We want this story to live forever - as a homage to all those things.

And what a better way to do that than to immortalise this story on the Ethereum blockchain to take the message of freedom to eternity?