In June 2025, a photograph of a lot called “Freedom Pan”, allegedly exhibited at one of the British auctions, appeared on Telegram channels. This piece of utensil was reportedly used by protesters in Kyiv during the Revolution of Dignity. We have verified the accuracy of such publications.
A photograph of the lot from the auction in London circulated on June 19. The photo shows a saucepan behind protective glass, and the label below reads: ““Freedom Saucepan”, Kyiv, 2014. Starting price: £15,000." The authors of publications about this lot specify that such pots were worn on the heads of Euromaidan participants.
Telegram channels spoke about the “Castle of Freedom” put up for auction “The world of Mikhail Onufrienko"(207,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), "Russian bun and green stick"(204,000), "Uncle Slava"(184,000), Zergulio (156,000), "Voblya • news"(147,000), "Sheikh Tamir"(138,000), etc.
On January 16, 2014, at the height of the protests that later became known as “Euromaidan”, or “Revolution of Dignity”, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine accepted a number of laws restricting participation in mass protests. In particular, demonstrators were prohibited from covering their faces and wearing helmets and other protective equipment. Protesters protest started come to the protests with pots, colanders and other kitchen utensils on their heads to emphasize the absurdity of the new restrictions and at the same time protect themselves from possible forceful acceleration. However, in Ukraine, dishes did not become a symbol of protest - by January 20, new laws called resonance, which led to a violent confrontation between Euromaidan participants and the police, and then the first victims appeared. At the same time, in the pro-Russian media, Ukrainians who participated in the protests of 2013–2014 became call it offensive pan-headed.
Proof that one of the pots worn at the Euromaidan rally became an auction lot in London is just one photograph. The information on the label included in the photo is extremely scarce - it does not indicate the previous owner (or, if it is an art object, the author) and does not describe the detailed history of the item, as is usually the case do in such cases. The auction house that put the lot up for auction is not named in most cases. Some users of the social network X who published the photo claimed, that we are talking about the Sotheby’s house, but “Pots of Freedom” No on his trading calendar. “Verified” did not find such a lot on the websites of other major auction houses operating in the British capital.
It can be assumed that this pan was put up at one of the many charity auctions held by non-profit organizations and activists around the world in support of Ukraine. However, no evidence for this hypothesis could be found. Moreover, for such an auction the starting price of £15,000 seems unrealistically high. As a rule, on such auctions they sell works by Ukrainian artists or local residents, and the final price of most lots is several times lower. In October 2024, Christie's spent the largest charity auction, which featured works by famous Ukrainian artists, and even there only a few paintings were sold above the starting price of the “Casserole of Freedom”.
The photo of the lot itself also looks unnatural. Judging by the reflection, the glass covers the lot only from the back, and a blurry reflection of the author of the photograph is also visible in it. On the label, the background behind the text with the name of the work and its price is pixelated - the inscription was probably added in a photo editor.
“Verified” analyzed the image using two services to identify AI-generated content. Both tools rated the likelihood that the image was generated by a neural network as high. Moreover, the probability was higher when analyzing pictures in which the text label was closed or cropped. Most likely, the image of the pan itself was generated, after which text was superimposed on it in a photo editor.
Although auctions in support of residents of Ukraine or with the participation of works by Ukrainian artists wide illuminated in the media, authoritative English- and Ukrainian-language sources did not report on the “Castle of Freedom” put up for auction. The photo was distributed mainly by Russian-language Telegram channels and users X. In this case, there are several publications, translated into English, in which for some reason the price is indicated in rubles.
The earliest publication mentioning the "Liberty Casserole" along with a photo of the lot that Verified found is appeared in the Telegram channel “Kryminforum” on June 19 at 14:04 Moscow time. This channel is often meets in our analyzes as the primary source and distributor of fakes about Ukraine.
Thus, there is no evidence that at a past, ongoing or just announced auction in London, a saucepan once worn by one of the Euromaidan participants was put up as a lot. The photo used as evidence was highly likely created using AI, and first appeared on a pro-Kremlin Telegram channel that had previously been caught spreading fakes.
Cover photo: social networks
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