Empty Chair demonstration
Empty Chair demonstration
Photograph of protesters at an ‘Empty Chair’ demonstration that was organised by the Latvian Centre and held on 1 February 2019 in front of the Russian Embassy in Riga. This demonstration called attention to the cases of Ukrainian writers imprisoned in Russia, including Oleg Sentsov, a Ukrainian filmmaker who was arrested and sentenced for twenty years for protesting against Russia’s annexation of Crimea. The English Centre has used the symbol of an empty chair at its events for over thirty years. Today, PEN continues to use the symbol of an empty chair at its events to represent writers who are absent from meetings as a result of being imprisoned or persecuted.











