%0 Journal Article
%T The extraordinary case of Russian performance artist Pyotr Pavlensky: Psychopathology or contemporary art?
%A Vladimir D. Mendelevich
%J Transcultural Psychiatry
%@ 1461-7471
%D 2019
%R 10.1177/1363461518762274
%X This article examines the psychiatric and political issues surrounding the case of the controversial Russian performance artist Pyotr Pavlensky, who received a number of court-ordered psychiatric evaluations as part of the legal actions initiated subsequent to his political protest actions. The author presents the results of his own clinical investigation into Pavlensky¡¯s case, arguing that previous diagnoses made by psychiatrists were unwarranted and unreasonable. This case draws the attention of experts to a problem: the need for more accurate criteria for the differentiation of behavioral disorders from behavior understood locally as socially-deviant. This issue is especially relevant during the assessment of the mental health of persons engaged in socially transgressive behavior which is explicitly framed as aesthetic and political action
%K behavioral disorders
%K contemporary art
%K diagnostics
%K performance
%K postmodernism
%K psychopathology
%K Pyotr Pavlensky
%U https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1363461518762274