Russian Believers Take the Plunge

The Jan. 9 snowfall ranked among the five heaviest in Moscow’s 146 years of weather records.

Indigenous and minority communities have made an effort to revive their ancestral traditions of greeting the new year since the Soviet collapse.

Russia in 2025 was shaped by extremes of weather, war and political control and the moments of uneasy normality that persisted alongside them.

Bulatov was a leading figure of the Soviet pop art scene, bending figurative imagery with slogans and text to challenge state propaganda.