Soviet Art

The village of Gridino. 1972. Soviet landscape painter Sulo Yuntunen 1915-1980

Soviet landscape painter Sulo Yuntunen
Rightly considered the pioneer of the modern Karelian landscape, Sulo Yuntunen managed to look at the nature of Karelia through the eyes of our contemporary, to plastically comprehend it in a new way. According to the artist, it is not enough to admire nature. This will inevitably lead to copying. You will work “under Levitan” or “under Van Gogh.” In order to show life in its own way, one must learn to think.”
Member of the USSR Union of artists (1946)
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Peasant woman from Rusov. 1971. Oil on canvas. Soviet Ukrainian artist Vladimir Patyk (October 9, 1929 – August 28, 2016)

Soviet Ukrainian artist Vladimir Patyk (October 9, 1929 – August 28, 2016) – landscape painter, still-life master, one of the greatest artists in Ukrainian painting of the second half of the twentieth century. People’s Artist of Ukraine, Vladimir Iosifovich Patik was born in the village of Cherny Ostrov, Lvov region. He studied at the Lvov Institute of Applied and Decorative Arts (1947-1953). The first participation in the regional art exhibition took place in his native Lvov in 1954. And after 4 years, he became a member of the Union of Artists of the USSR. Then followed the republican exhibitions “Soviet Ukraine” (1960, 1961). In addition, in 1968 he participated in the group exhibition of Soviet art in Moscow (1968). Meanwhile, his first foreign exhibition took place in 1969 in Poland. The artist also participated in an exhibition dedicated to the centenary of the birth of Lenin in Moscow (1970) and the 50th anniversary of the formation of the USSR in 1972.
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Carousel. 1975. Painting by Soviet Russian artist Natalia Nesterova (born 1944, Moscow)

Soviet Russian artist Natalia Nesterova
The work of young Soviet artists of the 1970s unfolded a wide panorama of directions and styles before the viewer. And a significant place in it belongs to works that open us in a special festive world, seen as if by the eyes of a child or a “naive” non-professional painter. Mastering and creative rethinking of fine folklore, which is the basis of this trend and in essence is a continuation of the national traditions of the national picture, lubok, handicrafts, united many young masters. To the same pleiade of painters belongs the Moscow artist Natalia Nesterova.
Born in 1944 in Moscow, Natalia Nesterova graduated from the Moscow State Art Institute named after Surikov (1968). In 1969 she became a member of the USSR Union of Artists.
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Letter. 1967. Oil, canvas. Painting by Soviet Russian artist Ksenia Nechitailo (born 1942)

Soviet Russian artist Ksenia Nechitailo

Born in 1942, Ksenia Nechitailo graduated from the State Art Institute named after V.I. Surikov of the USSR Academy of Arts, with honors. Member of the USSR Union of Artists since 1969, her paintings are in the State Tretyakov Gallery, the State Russian Museum, the art galleries of Orenburg, Vologda, Perm, Krasnoyarsk and other cities.
In one of her first paintings “Letter” (1967) the artist most frankly “expressed” her fascination with Russian art of the early twentieth century. An uncomplicated plot, a rough deformation of a a woman’s figure reading letter, ridiculous, at first glance, combinations of colors – all this resembles the “folk-tray style” of neo-primitivistic portraits. In such a frank demonstration of the beloved aesthetic prototypes, we see a kind of challenge to the modern pictorial school, and the artist’s right to be fascinated with the style of the past.
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Soviet Latvian sculptor Teodor Zalkaln 1876-1972

The art of Soviet Latvian sculptor Teodor Zalkaln, Hero of Socialist Labor, member of the Academy of Arts of the USSR, People’s Artist of the USSR, belongs to the bright pages of Latvian culture, its truly national values. In one of his speeches the artist said: “I am a sculptor, I have subordinated all my life to the tasks of a sculptor, this was my joy, and the reason for my worries.” As a sculptor I looked at life as an artist trying to understand and convey in my images our Latvian life, in which I see the essence of our people.”
The search for a monumental image, the desire to embody the beauty, strength and integrity of the national character were the basis of the work of Teodor Eduardovich Zalkaln. The images of his mother, who had borne the calamities of the First World War, the monuments built according to the plan of monumental propaganda, and the majestic portraits show that the artist has always understood the life, hopes and aspirations of the people.
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Red Army soldier figure. Work by Soviet Tuvan folk master Dongak Okaanchik 1896-1972. Photo – tuvaonline.ru

Soviet Tuvan folk master Dongak Okaanchik 1896-1972

One of the original Tuvan folk masters, the name of Dongak Okaanchik stands alongside such celebrated carvers and stone-cutters who glorified Tuva far beyond Russia, like Hertec Toybuhaa, Mongush Cherzy, Raisa Arakchaa, Kogel Saaya, and others.
Okaanchik lived a long life (1896-1972). Born in a country that was part of China, he saw the formation of the young state of the People’s Republic of China, and witnessed how a small republic became part of the vast country of the USSR. His works – a sculpture of small form of wood and traditional musical instruments – are well known to serious connoisseurs of applied art in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Novosibirsk, Krasnoyarsk and other large cities of Russia. And one of the works of the Tuvan master, “Devig” is in the Kunstkammer in St. Petersburg.
In fact, in the 1960s, during the heyday of culture in the Tuva ASSR, his works repeatedly participated at major all-Union exhibitions of Soviet Art in Moscow and Leningrad. At present, the largest collection of works by the master Okaanchik is in the funds of National museum of Tuva.
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The image of Stalin in painting “Triumph of the masses”. 1930s. Soviet artist Georgy Alekseev 1881-1951

Soviet artist Georgy Alekseev
Famous Soviet sculptor, painter and graphic artist, Georgy Dmitrievich Alekseev (1881-1951) was one of the most passionate and talented propagandists of the Marxist-Leninist ideas of the 1920s-1930s. He was not only a witness, but also a living participant of the Russian revolution. Alekseev graduated from the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, where he studied in the workshops of I. Repin, S. Korovin, and N. Kasatkin. In 1907 he became the creator of one of his first busts of Karl Marx, commissioned by the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP). In 1924 he became the author of his most famous work – “The Calling Leader”, replicated in hundreds of copies in the squares, railway stations, museums and squares of many cities of the Soviet Union.
Meanwhile, in the early 1920s he collaborated with V.V. Mayakovsky and M.M. Cheremnykh in the “Windows of Satire ROSTA”. Noteworthy, in 1923 he created the poster “Ultimatum”, mentioned by N. Ostrovsky in the novel “How the Steel Was Tempered”.
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