Soviet Art

The sculptural group ‘partisans’ in the lobby of the metro station Partizanskaya, Moscow closeup. Soviet sculptor Matvey Manizer (1891-1966)

Works by Soviet sculptor Matvey Manizer (1891-1966) are well known to millions of people visiting Moscow. Frontier guard with a dog, woman with chicken, a young worker with a gear wheel, a revolutionary sailor, and dozens of other sculptures decorate the most famous Metro station “Revolution Square”. Soviet sculptor Matvey Manizer created them during 1936-1939. Matvey Manizer (1891-1966) – People’s Artist of the USSR (1958), Vice-President of the USSR Academy of Arts (1947-1966), the winner of three Stalin Prizes (1941, 1943, 1950). He created a number of works that have become classics of socialist realism. During the Great Patriotic War, in 1943 he donated the awarded Stalin Prize (the sum of 100 000 rubles) to the defense Fund. Soviet sculptor Matvey Manizer was the author of Stalin’s death mask.
Read more »

Soviet Artists Painting War Time. S.D. Kichko (b. 1946) Farewell. 1972. Oil on canvas

Soviet Artists Painting War Time
The Great Patriotic War became obvious the most important factor in the development of art in the 1940s. Soviet artists and sculptors, like other citizens, have been actively involved in the protection of the country, but because of the nature of their profession, they (as well as writers) were attracted to propaganda tasks, determined by the government, who gave an enormous role in this period. During the war, there were significant works of easel graphics, and the variety of experiences has given rise to a variety of forms. It is fast and accurate front-line documentary sketches, different in technique, style and artistic level. These were portrait drawings of soldiers, guerrillas, sailors, nurses, commanders – a rich chronicle of the war, then transferred in part in the engraving. In the scenery of the war a special place is occupied by the image of besieged Leningrad. War time painting had its stages. At the beginning of the war – the artists mainly fixed what they saw, not aspiring to a generalization, almost hasty pictorial sketches. Artists painted on live impressions, which they had a lot. These paintings always had a great sincerity, passion, admiration by people bravely withstanding inhumane challenges, integrity and honesty of artistic vision, a desire to be extremely conscientious and accurate.
Read more »

Sitting ballerina. Bronze. 1971. Soviet sculptor Angelina Filippova

The creative manner of the Soviet sculptor Angelina Filippova (1923-1986) is characterized by an excellent ownership of the form, understanding of the expressive possibilities of the material, sense of composition. The ability to successfully and rhythmically organize a composition space appeared in a series of works devoted to the ballet: “Sitting ballerina”, “Russian Ballet School”, “The Ballerinas”, “Holiday”, “Debutante,” “Ballet” and others. Since 1960, Filippova began working with great enthusiasm in the most interesting area of ​​plastics – medal art in which she showed great ingenuity and subtlety of composition. The first medal, dedicated to the 150th anniversary of the death of Bagration, was followed by other works. Her medal gallery consists of bronze images of Beethoven, Rafael, Schiller, Stepan Razin, Dargomyzhsky, Magellan and others. Filippova was a constant participant of art exhibitions. Many of her works were awarded diplomas and certificates, and the sculptor herself – the title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR.
Read more »

Soviet artist Yuri Podlyasky (1923-1987) On the the Ob River. 1965-1967. Canvas, oil

Soviet artist Yuri Podlyasky (1923-1987) – member of the Leningrad Union of Artists (1949), Honored Artist of Russia, People’s Artist of the USSR. He is the author of genre paintings, landscapes and portraits of contemporaries, one of the brightest representatives of the Leningrad school of painting. Yuri Stanislavovich Podlyasky was born in 1923 in the Far East of Russia. Since childhood, he became interested in drawing and went to school at the Palace of Pioneers in Vyshny Volochyok, where he moved with his parents. He continued his education in Leningrad, in the art school at the Academy of Fine Arts. In 1942 he entered the Leningrad Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture named after Ilya Repin.
Read more »

Soviet Russian sculptor Alexander Rukavishnikov. Portrait of Vladimir Vysotsky. 1981. Marble

Soviet Russian sculptor Alexander Rukavishnikov was born October 2, 1950 in Moscow, the USSR. He became a member of the USSR Union of Artists in 1974, Honored Artist of the RSFSR and the Kirghiz SSR in 1984. In the period of 1986-1988 Alexander was a Secretary of the Union artists of the USSR. In 1995 he was given a title of People’s artist of the Russian Federation. The same year Alexander became the Head of the Department of sculpture of Moscow State Art Institute named after VI Surikov, and professor (1999). In 1997 he was chosen a Member of the Russian Academy of Arts and member of the Presidential Commission on culture. Alexander Iulianovich Rukavishnikov – master of monumental and easel compositions, sculptural portraits. In 1976 he was awarded the Lenin Komsomol Prize (1976) – for the sculpture “Builders”, “Work”, “Michelangelo.”
Read more »

Reaper. 1929. Oil on canvas. Painting by Soviet artist Alexei Pakhomov

Soviet artist Alexei Pakhomov (1900-1973) – People’s Artist of the USSR (1971), Full member of the USSR Academy of Arts (1964), Laureate of the State Prize of the USSR (1973 – posthumously) and the Stalin Prize of the second degree (1946). Alexey Fyodorovich Pakhomov was born September 19 October, 1900 in the village of Varlamovo of Vologda Region. From an early age he showed talent for drawing. With the active assistance of members of the local nobility (the son and his father Zubov), he was sent first to a primary school in the city of Kadnikov, and then in 1915 to Petrograd School of Drawing of Baron Stieglitz. Pakhomov studied at the shop of N.A. Tyrsa, and after serving in the army goes to the studio of V.V. Lebedev. Many avant-garde trends that prevailed in the first quarter of the XX century had an impact on the teachers and therefore the school education system.
Read more »

Portrait of Indira Gandhi. 1970. Oil. Painting by Soviet artist Dmitry Nalbandyan (1906-1993)

Soviet artist Dmitry Nalbandyan
Artist Ilya Glazunov recalled that, in connection with the preparation to the official visit of Leonid Brezhnev to India 1973, he decided to “make an original gift – a portrait by one of the masters of socialist realism to a friendly government leader Indira Gandhi. To execute a responsible job to Delhi was sent academician Dmitry Abramovich Nalbandyan. He tried very hard, but when he showed the completed work to Indira Gandhi, she barely glanced at the canvas, noting: “I am not an Armenian.” And she refused to take a picture. Nalbandyan then exhibited it in the Arena with the inscription “Property of the author”. Nalbandyan created portraits of many representatives of the Soviet elite (including Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchev, Brezhnev), for which in the art circles he was called “the first brush of the Politburo.” Dmitry Nalbandyan – full member of the USSR Academy of Arts (1953), Stalin Prize (1946, 1951), and Lenin Prize (1982) winner. In 1978, for a group portrait of figures of Armenian culture “Vernatun” was awarded the gold medal of the USSR.
Read more »