Soviet Art

Lyucia, 1986. Oil on cardboard. Soviet artist Margarita Dmitrievna Ruban (May 1, 1934 – October 21, 2011)

Soviet artist Margarita Dmitrievna Ruban was a member of the Union of Artists of the USSR. Born May 1, 1934 in Yanaul, Bashkortostan, she grew up in Leningrad (since 1937). She showed her ability to draw very early. Accordingly, in 1953-1961 she studied at the Tavrichesky Art College. After graduation from the college she entered the Faculty of Painting at the Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture of I.E. Repin of Academy of Arts of the USSR. She studied in the workshops of prominent Soviet artists Yuri Neprintsev and A.D. Romanichev (1961-1967). The diploma painting “Attack repulsed” was dedicated to the difficult tense years of the Great Patriotic War, witnessed by Ruban herself, having experienced all the 900 days of the blockade.
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The monument to Musa Jalil erected May 1 1966 in Kazan in memory of the Hero of the Soviet Union, laureate of the Lenin Prize, participant in the anti-fascist underground, executed in Nazi prison in 1944. Work by Soviet sculptor Vladimir Efimovich Tsigal 1917-2013

Soviet sculptor Vladimir Efimovich Tsigal (17 September, 1917- 4 July, 2013) was Academician of the USSR Academy of Arts (1978, Corresponding Member 1964). People’s Artist of the USSR (1978), awarded the Lenin Prize (1984), the Stalin Prize of the First Degree (1950) and the RSFSR State Prize of the Repin (1966). Member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union since 1952.

Born on 17 September 1917 in Odessa, in the 1920s he lived in Penza, where he graduated from high school. In 1937-1942 he studied at the State Art Institute named after VI Surikov in Moscow. Being a graduate student, in 1942 Vladimir volunteered to the front. Until 1944 he served in the Navy as a military artist. Participated in the landing in Novorossiysk and Kerch, as well as in other combat operations of the Black Sea and Baltic fleets. In 1945, the Committee for the Arts sent him with the famous sculptor Kerbel to Berlin. Their task was to build monuments to the soldiers of the Red Army in Berlin, Zeelow, and Kiistrin.
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Portrait of E.M. Bebutova. 1922. Soviet Russian painter Pavel Varfolomeevich Kuznetsov (17 November, 1878, Saratov – 21 February, 1968, Moscow)

Soviet Russian painter Pavel Varfolomeevich Kuznetsov (17 November, 1878, Saratov – 21 February, 1968, Moscow) quickly and unconditionally accepted the revolution. He genuinely believed in the slogans it proclaimed. And believed that, just after the victory of the October Revolution, art should have been assigned one of the most crucial roles in the grandiose plans for building a new life. He actively participated in the design of public holidays, and was an initiative member of the Department of Fine Arts Commission and the protection of monuments of art and antiquities of the Moscow Soviet of Workers’ and Red Army deputies.
Simultaneously, the artist worked in the College of Fine Arts, and even before the October days, in July 1917, he became an art editor of the magazine “The Way of Liberation”, combining it with teaching at the Stroganov School of Monumental Painting. In 1918 he became elected professor at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. In both educational institutions, Kuznetsov directed the workshops, and when the two free art workshops merged, Kuznetsov headed the united monumental workshop up until the end of 1929.
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To the light. Triptych. Central part. Oil. 1970. Soviet Turkmen artist Chary Amangeldyev (born July 5, 1933)

Soviet Turkmen artist Chary Amangeldyev – member of the USSR Union of artists, People’s Artist of the Republic of Turkmenistan.
Born on July 5, 1933 in Ashgabat, he graduated from the Ashkhabad Art College in 1951 and the Moscow State Art Institute named after VI Surikov in 1965. His thesis work was “Turkmen carpet-weavers” (led by famous Soviet artist D.K. Mochalsky). Meanwhile, in the Moscow State Art Institute Chary Amangeldyev first received a diploma of a restorer, and then graduated from painting department.
Amangeldyev was a permanent participant of All-Union, republican, and international exhibitions of Soviet Art since 1957. And his personal exhibitions took place in 1974, 1983 in Turkmen State Museum of Fine Arts, Ashgabat. Besides, he was a participant of the 2nd Tashkent Biennale of Contemporary Art in 2002. His creativity no longer fit into the borders of Turkmenistan and the entire Soviet Union and went beyond them.
Associate Professor of the Turkmen Academy of Arts (1998-2004), Chary Amangeldyev made creative trips to Argentina, Bulgaria, Iran, Mongolia, Turkey, and Japan. His works are in the Turkmen State Museum of Fine Arts in Ashgabat, the State Tretyakov Gallery, the State Museum of Oriental Art in Moscow, and in private collections in the former USSR and abroad.
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Tonya, portrait. Oil on cardboard. Painting by Soviet artist Boris Ivanovich Vagin (1920-2002)

Soviet artist Boris Ivanovich Vagin – talented Russian painter born in Tula. In his childhood, he studied in the Tula art school. Later, in 1936, he moved to Leningrad to study at the Leningrad Art Studio. After having graduated from the studio, in 1939, he returned to his native Tula, where he lived and worked till his last days. Since 1941, he took an active part in the city, regional and zonal exhibitions of Soviet Art, including Moscow region. In addition, his personal exhibition took place in Tula in 1979. Works by Boris Ivanovich Vagin are in the State art museum in Tula, many regional museums, the Art Fund of the Russian Federation, as well as in private collections, sold at Western, Russian and Ukrainian auctions.
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Caucasian. 1979. Oil on canvas. Soviet Russian painter Viktor Ladeyschikov (born 1928, Sverdlovsk – died 1987, Kiev, the USSR)

Soviet Russian painter Viktor Ladeyschikov
Born in the village of Istok of Sverdlovsk region, Russia, Viktor Leonidovich graduated from the Sverdlovsk Art College (1950). Later, he moved to the Ukraine, where he entered the Kiev Art Institute, from which he graduated in 1956. He studied in the workshops of master of Soviet Art K. Trokhimenko and participated in republic art exhibitions while still a student. The same 1956 Ladeyschikov participated in All Union exhibitions of Soviet art and became the member of the USSR Union of Artists. Socialist realism artist, he worked mostly in the field of easel painting, and in particular, genre painting.
He created several paintings dedicated to social life. The artist’s works are in many regional museums of Russia and Ukraine and in private collections in Russia, as well as in England, Germany, Spain, and Japan. Works of the artist are very rare in the art market.

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New Settlers. Oil on canvas. 1965. Soviet Belarusian artist Mai Dantsig (27 April, 1930 – 26 March, 2017)

Soviet Belarusian artist Mai Dantsig 1930-2017

The passion for bright large canvases, life-affirming pathos, publicism are characteristic of the work of Mai Danzig. The artist perceives reality as if on a widescreen scale and speaks with the viewer in full force of voice and in full measure of emotions. Even the names of his paintings sounded exalted: “The Soligorsk land is rumbling”, “Belarus is the mother of the partisans” …
Danzig began with sketches, genre scenes and portraits. He painted the secluded corners of Minsk against the background of the sky with white clouds reminiscent of flying sails. He deployed on the canvases the prospects of squares and quarters with cranes, created a series of picturesque reports from the new buildings of the republic.
In the painting “New settlers” the artist clearly pretends to cause in the viewer complex associations. In the smiles and poses of his heroes, in the spaciousness of a freshly painted room, not cluttered with things of sustainable well-being, he seeks to express not so much the joy of a young family who has received a new apartment, but the bright and solemn feelings of the builders of a new life.
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