Last night’s MTV Video Music Awards were full of tributes to the award show’s history, such as Britney Spears’s yellow python. But when Cuban singer Camila Cabello took to the VMAs stage, her balaclava-wearing back up singers were seemingly inspired by contemporary art, not pop music. Their attire appeared to be a nod to Pussy Riot, the feminist performance art group known for their political activism.

Though Pussy Riot cofounder Nadya Tolokonnikova doesn’t consider the collective a band, the group rose to prominence by performing their song Punk Prayer on the steps of Moscow’s cathedral in 2012. Tolokonnikova and two other women were sent to prison on charges of hooliganism as a result of the protest performance piece.

Pussy Riot has continued their activism in the 12 years since, releasing new music and artworks. When Tolokonnikova performs with the group, it is often with female backup dancers wearing fishnets, lingerie, and the signature Pussy Riot face mask.

The similarities with Cabello’s VMA performance were undeniable. The musician started out inside a glass-walled room on the stage, watching a video on a laptop of herself singing with bleach blonde hair. Then, with newly dyed dark locks, Cabello began performing live, while women in bras, miniskirts, and balaclavas brandished weapons as if poised to break her out of the box.

After smashing the laptop, Cabello emerged for the end of the song, posing with the backup dancers as they unmasked their faces.

“It’s bittersweet,” Tolokonnikova told me. “I wish they would reach out—obviously not to ask for a permission, that’s not needed, but just to be friendly.”

It isn’t the first time Cabello has used the balaclava. To promote her most recent album, C,XOXO, released in June, she released a video trailer featuring shots of her wearing a bejeweled pink balaclava. The outfit is currently the still image on the corresponding pinned Instagram post.

And after Cabello performed with Lana Del Rey at this year’s Coachella music festival, she shared a thank you note with a photo of several women wearing pink and blue balaclavas.

(Tolokonnikova took note, posting on X, formerly known as Twitter that she was “so thrilled that Camila Cabello and Lana Del Rey joined Pussy Riot!”

Tolokonnikova has long maintained that anyone can take up the Pussy Riot cause and become a member of the group by donning the balaclava in the name of political protest. But does destroying your laptop at the VMAs qualify?

Cabello rose to fame as a member of the girl group Fifth Harmony, formed in 2012 during the second season of televised singing competition The X Factor.  She left the band in 2016 and has since become a successful solo act.

Camila Cabello performs on stage during the 2024 MTV Video Music Awards at UBS Arena on September 11, 2024 in Elmont, New York. Her backup dancers are dressed like Pussy Riot, with skimpy outfits and balaclavas covering their faces. Photo by Johnny Nunez/Getty Images for MTV.

As of press time, Cabello’s press representatives had not responded to my request for comment. But there is no evidence that either song she sang at the VMAs is meant as a political anthem.

“June Gloom” is about reconnecting with an ex-boyfriend, Cabello told crowds at a performance in Lisbon earlier this year—presumably Shawn Mendes, who she dated from 2019 to 2021.

After the breakup, the two shared a kiss in the crowd at Coachella in 2023, seemingly referenced in the song’s original lyrics “How come you’re just so much better?/Is this gonna end ever?/I guess I’ll fuck around and find out/Are you coming to Coachella?/If you don’t, it’s whatever/If you do, honey, it’ll be all I think about.” (The music festival named-dropped in the demo Cabello shared on Instagram is not mentioned in the final recording.)