Art in the Soviet Union

[RevolverNo9]

I'd be interest to know how the remaining Stalinists (erherm) tackle the issue of art in the Soviet Union. Now, acknowledging the Marxian historical model of 'base' and 'superstructure' (in the context of the 'organic totality') - one must surely accept that the art of the Soviet Union will reflect the nature of basic reality in Russia. Soviet Realism was one of the most reactionary and totalitarian artistic forms to have ever existed, surpassing even (I would say) the grotesque idealisations of offical subjects found in 18th and 19th century European academicism and 'salon' art.

To the Stalinists I ask: how - without repudiating the tools of analysis set forth in historical materialism - can you possibly accomodate this glaring inconsistancy?

The short answer is obviously: you can't!

But a bit of debate would no doubt be interesting. Below I thought I'd post an article I wrote describing the initial processes of Soviet art. Feel free to criticise!

[RevolverNo9]

Cut off from its historical base, socialised without a socialist reality, art reverts to its ancient prehistorical function: it assumes magical character. – Herbert Marcuse



The Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 gave way to a surge of radical enthusiasm: here was a moment in history in which the opportunity to construct a new and better society seemed a reality. In this perceived new order, art became of paramount importance. Freed from alienating and exploitative labour, the artist could at last, he thought, look towards a project of unfettered creation. It was in this atmosphere that the avant-garde flourished as some of the most progressive proponents of the international modernist movement, including Malevich and Lissitzky, experimented with the Futurist and Cubist idioms, reaching its culmination in Constructivism. Yet the fate of art in the Soviet Union would not be liberation; rather it faced suppression and enslavement on an unprecedented scale while many of the most radical artists were to meet death.


Russian art before the 20th Century was permeated with anachronism and constraints. Up to the 1700s it remained exclusively religious and Byzantine in style, despite the fact that the era which created that art from a vital reaction with contemporary society had long since passed. These icons were never considered as works granting aesthetic satisfaction but only as an aid to spiritual contemplation and this vision of art – as something for the depiction of truth for a purpose – seems to have been a part of the Russian perspective throughout its history. When art of a secular nature emerged under Peter the Great, it was under the centralised control of an Academy (inspired by that of Louis XIV who said to his artists: ‘I entrust to you the most precious thing on earth – my fame’). All artists had their form and practice dictated to them before the painting of their particular subject. The Marxist critic John Berger explains this catastrophe, as relevant to Soviet Realism as it was to the former Academicism, in these terms: ‘[They] knew how they were going to paint before they knew what they were going to paint. As a result, their pictures reveal their choice of subject, but never the subjects themselves. A subject is revealed in art only when it has forced the artist to adapt his procedure, to admit in terms of his formal means its special case.’


Yet with the Revolution came a genuine striving for artistic progression. Modernism, with its passionate expectations of a new world order and practically religious article of faith of the might of the machine, gave powerful expression to the optimistic desires of a post-revolutionary society. Perhaps surprising (on initial inspection) was the parallel development of the political-aesthetic relationship between the Italian Futurists and Mussolini’s Fascist movement. While Rodchenko drew up daring designs for leftist magazines and proletarian kiosks, Marinetti was involved in the violent Fascist strike that destroyed the socialist paper Avanti. The constant desire for the new (‘A racing car whose hood is adorned by great pipes, like serpents of explosive breath – a roaring car that seems to run on shrapnel – is more beautiful than the Victory of Samothrace.’), the impetuous longing for negation of all that went before led to the Futurists becoming an ideological motor in what they saw as Mussolini’s brave new world, taking them out of that backwards Italy that was ‘a vast Pompeii, white with sepulchres’. ‘We will glorify war –’ said the First Futurist Manifesto, ‘the world’s only hygiene.’


Back in the USSR, the tension between free artistry and what was an inherently conservative state (ran, peculiarly for a ‘workers’ republic’, by lots of white, middle-class men) began to burst. Lenin – that radical – hated the avant-garde. Leftism for him was ‘an infantile disorder’ and in despair at the publication of Mayakovski’s modernist poem 150, 000, 000 he suggested the minister Lunacharski should be ‘flogged’ for having ever let it go to press. Much more to Lenin’s taste was a regressive naturalism, and he longed for a ‘monumental propaganda’, statues of revolutionaries – from Proudhon to Cezanne – adorning the streets of Moscow and Petrograd. Once again displaying his rather dubious desire for the progressive, one of his major inspirations appears to have been the Renaissance thinker Campanella, who in his City of the Sun, Lenin writes, ‘says that the walls of his fantastic socialist city are covered with frescoes, serving the youth with graphic lessons in natural science and history, arouse civic feeling and, in a word, participate in the business of raising and educating the new generation.’ After having rather astutely noted that frescoes might not be viable in the Russia climate, Lenin was shocked by the contributions of artists for the ‘raising and educating’ of his people. (So, for that matter, were the people: a statue of Bakunin was demolished on sight.) It became clear that the purely aesthetic aims of the artists would not meet the needs of Leninist ruling ideology (let alone the downwards-slope of Stalinism). One must also remember when looking at the striking abstract simplicity of Lissitzky’s Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge (1919) that this was near incomprehensible to both a conservative ruling-class and a backwards peasantry. Here in the 21st century we can immediately appreciate the simple geometric shapes – reduced from the figurative to a mental ideal – and their dynamic motion and conflict. For a Volga-dwelling fishmonger, lacking education, or a reactionary bureaucrat, lacking imagination, such an image simply made no sense.


For these reasons the artistic Left faced suppression. Even if there was steel to build Tatlin’s Monument to the Third International (1919) (or, for that matter, even if it was physically possible to construct) with its dialectical spirals of glass and iron, its revolving rooms and slanting legs straddling the river, the Party would not have wanted it, no matter how many Dadaists wrote and constructed eulogies for him. Gradually the modernists were barred from public patronage and replaced by realist painters of, at times, remarkable timidity in the form of the AKhRR, remnants of the Academic style that so restricted the art of the past. In a painter such as Deineka, however, we can observe this fascinating transformation, from modernism to the official state-art that would become so infamous. His famous The Defence of Petrograd (1928) or Textile Workers (1927) are both liminal paintings; there is a still visible modernist formalism, a mechanical abstraction, a reduction of objects into the plane of ideas. Yet the tendency is back towards realism – though not yet the anaemic naturalism so typical of Soviet Realism – and Textile Workers is imbued with blunt symbolism in service of the state. The white colouring, the strength of body and determination of expression in the women all conspire to give an image of worker efficiency and discipline.


The emphasis on the body in the Soviet Union was not new as the 20’s drew to a close, but its conception came to be altered. Marx believed that under socialism, freed from the chains of exploitation, the individual would have the time and ability to pursue particular projects of interest of self-improvement, if so desired. After the Revolution this view became distorted by the contemporary fetish for the machine-world. The improvement of the individual became entirely understood in physical terms and a crude mechanistic understanding of human behaviour proposed to maximise a worker’s efficiency through training the body into automatic responses to stimuli, as was attempted in the ‘psychotechnic’ laboratories that were established, while even actors were trained to recreate ‘spontaneity’ systematically through Meierhold’s ‘biomechanics’ technique. Soviet art promoted this vision of the body, as an infallibly productive machine. Workers were depicted in propaganda as physically strong and healthy, while the capitalist was sickly, excessively rotund and balding. This emphasis of the strength of the body can be seen in Deineka’s work, there bordering on the grotesque.


As total state control was extended over art, and as Stalinist ideology solidified, the body became instead a symbol of will-power. Ironically, the USSR began to adopt ideals that actually mirrored those of the capitalist west, rather than inverting them. Brodsky’s Lenin on the Tribune (1927) is astonishing for its hagiographic individualism: the whole painting’s world is configured around Lenin, the clouds circle his head with halo-like symbolism while the viewer is placed below, looking upwards to the individual’s face, like a preacher. The ‘ideal’ man (if he was unfortunate enough not to have been born as Lenin or Stalin) was the strongest, fastest, most efficient worker, as exemplified by the mythical accomplishments of the miner Stakhanov (who supposedly hewed 102 tons of coal – fourteen times his quota). This became the emphasis of art. Deineka’s work, for one, became more and more idealised, less and less grounded in reality, as all artists were instructed, as were the artists of the old Academy, how to construct their work before they admitted the particular case of their subject. The contradictions between the idealised conception of Soviet life in art and the pains and impoverishment of reality became grosser and more disturbing. (Indeed, art under Stalin came to resemble that of the Third Reich to a sickening extent.) Prohibited from confronting the issues of reality, art really did, as Marcuse states, ‘[revert] to its prehistoric character: it [assumed] magical character.’ For this reason, this realist art forced to reflect an unreal-reality, this contradiction between ruling-class, superstructure-ideology and material, social reality, offers an instantaneous analysis of the grand, historical failure that was Revolutionary Russia.

[Janus]

surpassing even (I would say) the grotesque idealisations of offical subjects found in 18th and 19th century European academicism and 'salon' art.
I agree. The problem with socialist realism is its tendency to glorify leaders and become part of their cults of personality. Also, artists who did not do socialist realist art were considered social parasites and sometimes sent to labor camps. <_<

[Intelligitimate]

This little essay is long on bullshit and short on any sort of historical facts.

[Mesijs]

Originally posted by [email protected] 10 2006, 03:18 PM
This little essay is long on bullshit and short on any sort of historical facts.
Psst.... it&#39;s a source itself. No wait, if it&#39;s an anti-Stalinist source, so you keep asking for sources that are of your favourite indoctrinated history-writers.

[Intelligitimate]

Originally posted by Mesijs+Jun 10 2006, 05:22 PM--> (Mesijs @ Jun 10 2006, 05:22 PM)
[email protected] 10 2006, 03:18 PM
This little essay is long on bullshit and short on any sort of historical facts.
Psst.... it&#39;s a source itself. No wait, if it&#39;s an anti-Stalinist source, so you keep asking for sources that are of your favourite indoctrinated history-writers. [/b]
I&#39;m sorry, it&#39;s just hard for me to take art criticism seriously. I like the Socialist Realism art, I like Salvador Dahli and surrealist art, and I hate Picasso and cubist art in general. I dislike a lot of modern art. It always seemed bourgeois to me.

[Intelligitimate]

Before I went to bed last night, I was doing some searching, and it seems the accusation of some modern art being bourgeois is closer to the truth than I ever knew. It seems the CIA funded a lot of art during the Cold War. A google search reveals a lot of interesting articles.

[tambourine_man]

(intelligitimate)

I&#39;m sorry, it&#39;s just hard for me to take art criticism seriously. I like the Socialist Realism art, I like Salvador Dahli and surrealist art, and I hate Picasso and cubist art in general. I dislike a lot of modern art. It always seemed bourgeois to me.
Before I went to bed last night, I was doing some searching, and it seems the accusation of some modern art being bourgeois is closer to the truth than I ever knew. It seems the CIA funded a lot of art during the Cold War. A google search reveals a lot of interesting articles.


funny that you accuse "some modern art" of being bourgeois (presumably american abstract expressionism?) for being funded by the cia, but at the same time approve of dali, who was an open supporter of the franco regime, and, in fact, was booted out of the surrealist group by andre breton for being anti-communist. there was nothing inherently bourgeois or reactionary about abstract expressionism: it was more or less a-political; the cia endorsed it for the purpose of countering the more subversive, revolutionary influence of surrealism, and the stagnant, dogmatic social realism.

picasso and cubism were major influences on surrealism. there is really nothing bourgeois about cubism or picasso. cubism was an avant-garde art movement criticized heavily by traditionalists, conservatives, bureaucrats, and the like (all who we could rightly name "bourgeois"?). the cubists sought to revolutionize art by bringing it closer to the subjective, non-representational , abstract - a trend that finally culminated in andre breton&#39;s anti-rational surrealism. and, not that this matters any, picasso was an avowed communist all his life.

socialist realism was/is probably one of the most reactionary art forms to ever exist, not only in theory, but in practice. the real revolutionary art form in pre-stalinist russia - malevich&#39;s suprematism (google image search "black square" to see the most radical art ever produced, at least since dada) - was virtually wiped out of existence by the socialist realism bureacrats and state-slaves. socialist realism reached far back to the stagnant, traditional, representational art designed for a specific, somehow-objective purpose other than pure subjective self-expression. and the implications are obvious.

edit: i forgot the quotes.

[Intelligitimate]

funny that you accuse "some modern art" of being bourgeois (presumably american abstract expressionism?) for being funded by the cia, but at the same time approve of dali, who was an open supporter of the franco regime, and, in fact, was booted out of the surrealist group by andre breton for being anti-communist.

I didn&#39;t say I liked his politics.


there was nothing inherently bourgeois or reactionary about abstract expressionism: it was more or less a-political; the cia endorsed it for the purpose of countering the more subversive, revolutionary influence of surrealism, and the stagnant, dogmatic social realism.

I still wouldn&#39;t like it even if the CIA didn&#39;t endorse it.


picasso and cubism were major influences on surrealism...picasso was an avowed communist all his life.

I don&#39;t care, I still don&#39;t like it. I don&#39;t care if Picasso was a communist or not. Hell, Frida Kahlo was outright Stalinist, and I still don&#39;t like her art very much.

The reason I think a lot of this art is bourgeois is because it is clearly out of touch with working-class notions of what art is supposed to be. Social realism is not, and neither I would say is most surrealist art. Abstract expressionism, cubism, etc, are not highly praised by working class people. The tendency toward "subjective, non-representational , abstract" art is bourgeois in itself.


socialist realism was/is probably one of the most reactionary art forms to ever exist, not only in theory, but in practice.

Whatever. What the hell does this even mean?


the real revolutionary art form in pre-stalinist russia - malevich&#39;s suprematism (google image search "black square" to see the most radical art ever produced, at least since dada)

Looks like a piece of shit to me.


was virtually wiped out of existence by the socialist realism bureacrats and state-slaves.

Good-riddance, I say.


socialist realism reached far back to the stagnant, traditional, representational art designed for a specific, somehow-objective purpose other than pure subjective self-expression. and the implications are obvious.

You mean actually trying to draw something is bad? Sheesh...try to sell that shit to the working class. See how many "black squares" they&#39;ll want...

[tambourine_man]

I still wouldn&#39;t like it even if the CIA didn&#39;t endorse it.

Looks like a piece of shit to me.

Good-riddance, I say.

i&#39;m sorry, i didn&#39;t realize we were discussing your personal aesthetic preferences...


The reason I think a lot of this art is bourgeois is because it is clearly out of touch with working-class notions of what art is supposed to be. Social realism is not, and neither I would say is most surrealist art. Abstract expressionism, cubism, etc, are not highly praised by working class people.


on the other hand, radical art encourages and expresses a more revolutionary consciousness (of course, here is where we may fundamentally differ, as i do not consider obedience a virtue). liberated from bourgeois conventions of acceptability, respectability, rationality, social utility, accessibility, etc. art can become a natural expression of life, rather than an alienated industry for consumption.


Whatever. What the hell does this even mean?


i&#39;m sorry, i should have said, "socialist realism was one of the most reactionary &#39;art forms&#39; ever to exist, both in terms of its theoritcal premise and its practical impact."
that is, that art should serve some purpose other than subjective self-expression is a powerful form of alienation (in more general terms, the person is divorced from his immediate inclination and is instead subjected to external authority as to how to live, spend time, express himself, etc etc).
and then, there was the practical impact of socialist realism, which was not only to aid in the destruction of any truly revolutionary art forms that might have thrived in the soviet union (see the russian avant-garde), but paintings like this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Roses_f...ladimirskij.jpg (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Roses_for_Stalin_by_Vladimirskij.jpg) (it&#39;s too ironic not to smile) contributed to and encouraged the atmosphere of political and social repression in stalinist russia (deny it, i don&#39;t care and niether does anyone else).


The tendency toward "subjective, non-representational , abstract" art is bourgeois in itself.

i do not agree (see above), but,
in that case, your appreciation of surrealist art is misguided, or at least very strange. andre breton described surrealism as "pure psychic automatism" - that is, the direct, unadultered expression of personal, subjective reality. following that, surrealists often incorporated abstraction and symbolism into their works in the most irrational, strange, inaccessible ways. in other words, what the fuck does this mean? (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/df/Dream_Caused_by_the_Flight_of_a_Bumblebee_around_a _Pomegranate_a_Second_Before_Awakening.jpg)

[Intelligitimate]

i&#39;m sorry, i didn&#39;t realize we were discussing your personal aesthetic preferences...

That is the only thing anyone in this thread is doing, except you want to pretend your bullshit preferences are somehow objective, by rooting them in anti-Stalinism, and by extension, anti-communism.


on the other hand, radical art encourages and expresses a more revolutionary consciousness

A "black square" doesn&#39;t express shit.


i&#39;m sorry, i should have said, "socialist realism was one of the most reactionary &#39;art forms&#39; ever to exist, both in terms of its theoritcal premise and its practical impact."

Still more meaningless crap.


that is, that art should serve some purpose other than subjective self-expression is a powerful form of alienation

Alienation is a phenomenon that occurs in capitalist commodity production. If you want to treat making art in a similar fashion to commodity production, there were no buyers for shit like a "black square" in the USSR. Why should an artist expect to make a living by painting shit no one wants? This is no different in bourgeois countries, yet I don&#39;t hear you screaming about artistic oppression because most artists can&#39;t make a living at it.


and then, there was the practical impact of socialist realism, which was not only to aid in the destruction of any truly revolutionary art forms that might have thrived in the soviet union (see the russian avant-garde), but paintings like this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Roses_f...ladimirskij.jpg (it&#39;s too ironic not to smile) contributed to and encouraged the atmosphere of political and social repression in stalinist russia (deny it, i don&#39;t care and niether does anyone else).

And this is where you real hatred comes in. And that painting is a thousand times more inspiring and meaningful than a "black square," which will only be appreciated by petty-bourgeois art snobs.


i do not agree (see above), but,
in that case, your appreciation of surrealist art is misguided, or at least very strange.

I don&#39;t like all surrealist art, but I find its strangeness often fascinating.

[RevolverNo9]

Intelligitmate - you&#39;re so clueless and self-contradictory it&#39;s hard to know where to start&#33;


This little essay is long on bullshit and short on any sort of historical facts.

I defy you to dispute any of my &#39;historical material&#39;. Just because material reality makes you feel uncomfortable doesn&#39;t mean you can deny it. Go on - just try to do it rationally rather than making empty, unsupported assertions. Just one supported refutal?

And anyway - are you going to deal with any of the glaring contradictions you&#39;ve made? If you actually like &#39;soviet realism&#39; - possibly the most reactionary art-form ever propogated - then surely you must also appreciate Italian Fascist art and German National Socialist art (whose similiarities with Stalinst art are uncanny, as demonstrated in my essay) as well as the official salon art of the nineteenth- and eighteenth- century bourgeoisie in which soviet realism has so many of its roots?


I like Salvador Dahli and surrealist art

Er... but you said you hated subjective expression in art?&#33;?&#33; Surrealism wanted to create an art entirely shaped by the subjective unconscience&#33; Plus a lot of it was pretty bourgeois anyway.


I didn&#39;t say I liked his politics.

But as Marxist do we not accept that &#39;being determines consciousness&#39;?&#33;


Social realism is not, and neither I would say is most surrealist art. Abstract expressionism, cubism, etc, are not highly praised by working class people. The tendency toward "subjective, non-representational , abstract" art is bourgeois in itself.

Social realism is often very good, be it a Ken Loach film or a painting that acutally depicts material reality&#33; Socialist or Soviet Realism on the other hand is not based on material reality - it is painted in accord with pre-conceived and prescribed ideals. It is idealist, bourgeois and the process of its creation is alienated&#33; I defy you to contradict this. Soviet art did not depict what was actually happening, it depicted an ideal of what society should look like. Just like salon art idealising kings and princes - exactly the same thing was being carried out in Stalinist Russia.

Illegitimate, do you not consider idealism, voluntarism and individualism all to be characteristic of bourgeois ideology? If not, perhaps you should be debating this in Opposing Ideologies...


Good-riddance, I say.

You think the unalienated profuction of art should be punished with death? Sounds like fascism to me.


QUOTE
i&#39;m sorry, i didn&#39;t realize we were discussing your personal aesthetic preferences...


That is the only thing anyone in this thread is doing, except you want to pretend your bullshit preferences are somehow objective, by rooting them in anti-Stalinism, and by extension, anti-communism.

We&#39;re only analysing aesthetic preference in so far that its the result of material societal conditions. An analysis of Soviet Art is an analysis of the superstructure of that society.


Alienation is a phenomenon that occurs in capitalist commodity production. If you want to treat making art in a similar fashion to commodity production, there were no buyers for shit like a "black square" in the USSR. Why should an artist expect to make a living by painting shit no one wants? This is no different in bourgeois countries, yet I don&#39;t hear you screaming about artistic oppression because most artists can&#39;t make a living at it.

Hah&#33; Yet more contradictions&#33; (Have you ever read Marx? Do you have a clue what alienation is?) In capitalism the artist&#39;s process of creation is alienated due to the demands of the market and the expectations put on the object of art as a commodity. He is therefore not free to pursue his own liberty in creation. In Stalinism however the conditions for creating art were actually more alienating than under capitalism&#33; Their methods were entirely dictated by a state super-authority. Artistic groups in the West who have attempted to negate the alienating role of the Market (such as the DaDaist, Surrealists and - especially - the Situationists) and have had varying degrees of success, would never have been able to do so in Russia&#33; Your beloved Dali (who&#39;s a pretty awful artist, I might add - but that&#39;s another matter) wouldn&#39;t have lasted five minutes in the USSR&#33;&#33;&#33;


And that painting is a thousand times more inspiring and meaningful than a "black square," which will only be appreciated by petty-bourgeois art snobs.

No it&#39;s idealist, unreal, individualist, queezy, sentimental trash&#33; It&#39;s like salon art on steroids&#33;

Intelligitimate, you really need to get your thoughts together&#33; Because right now it&#39;s just embarrassing&#33;

[Intelligitimate]

Intelligitmate - you&#39;re so clueless and self-contradictory it&#39;s hard to know where to start&#33;

I&#39;m sorry my art-snobbery isn&#39;t up to your level of shitheadedness. I&#39;ll try harder not to mix up terms like "social realism" and "socialist realism" in the future.


I defy you to dispute any of my &#39;historical material&#39;.

I defy you to actually write anything containing historical material in the first place.


And anyway - are you going to deal with any of the glaring contradictions you&#39;ve made? If you actually like &#39;soviet realism&#39; - possibly the most reactionary art-form ever propogated - then surely you must also appreciate Italian Fascist art and German National Socialist art (whose similiarities with Stalinst art are uncanny, as demonstrated in my essay) as well as the official salon art of the nineteenth- and eighteenth- century bourgeoisie in which soviet realism has so many of its roots?

Can&#39;t say I&#39;ve looked at much of it. It&#39;s probably better than shit like a "black square".


Er... but you said you hated subjective expression in art?&#33;?&#33;

No where did I say anything like this. This came from your imagination and nowhere else.


But as Marxist do we not accept that &#39;being determines consciousness&#39;?&#33;

I&#39;m sure Marx and Engels didn&#39;t have art in mind, and in any case, you seem much more enthralled with it than I am.


Socialist or Soviet Realism on the other hand is not based on material reality - it is painted in accord with pre-conceived and prescribed ideals.

More meaningless bullshit.


Soviet art did not depict what was actually happening, it depicted an ideal of what society should look like.

You don&#39;t like it because it doesn&#39;t conform to your anti-communist interpretation of history, in other words?


Illegitimate, do you not consider idealism, voluntarism and individualism all to be characteristic of bourgeois ideology? If not, perhaps you should be debating this in Opposing Ideologies...

I&#39;m not the one spewing shit about "subjective expression in art."


You think the unalienated profuction of art should be punished with death? Sounds like fascism to me.

Who was killed?


We&#39;re only analysing aesthetic preference in so far that its the result of material societal conditions. An analysis of Soviet Art is an analysis of the superstructure of that society.

In other words, your bullshit analysis of socialist realism is just another way to vent your hatred of the USSR and Stalin. That much was obvious from the beginning.


Hah&#33; Yet more contradictions&#33;

This is funny, because you admit exactly what I said in my paragraph: that artists are still constrained in what they paint in bourgeoisie society if they paint things no one wants to buy.


(Have you ever read Marx? Do you have a clue what alienation is?)

I could ask the same of you, because alienation isn&#39;t about the creation of art. It is about workers and commodity production.


Artistic groups in the West who have attempted to negate the alienating role of the Market (such as the DaDaist, Surrealists and - especially - the Situationists)

Don&#39;t forgot the CIA funding.


would never have been able to do so in Russia&#33;

So. It&#39;s a good thing the USSR didn&#39;t support artists who drew shit like a "black square." That they didn&#39;t support anything but socialist realism doesn&#39;t bother me either.


No it&#39;s idealist, unreal, individualist, queezy, sentimental trash&#33; It&#39;s like salon art on steroids&#33;

Translation: I hate Stalin, therefore this painting is bad.

[Dimentio]

What is wrong with romanticism? Sure that it is reactionary, but it is indeed beautiful.

[Black Dagger]

Intelligitimate, what about Stalin&#39;s leadership do you find so appealing?

[RevolverNo9]

Intelligitimate, I realise you&#39;re compensating for your lack of understanding and your inability to construct any rational or reasoned argument (and you openly state that you plan not to do so), but your flaming is not acceptable here. It just betrays your shortcomings and inadequacies so acutely it&#39;s mildly embarrassing.


I&#39;ll try harder not to mix up terms like "social realism" and "socialist realism" in the future.

Well you do that. They&#39;re completely different - at least you&#39;ve learnt something, eh?


I defy you to actually write anything containing historical material in the first place.

So... you can&#39;t refute anything I&#39;ve written. Go on - if there isn&#39;t any historical material in my essay, just pick a couple of details and show me the error of my ways. However, since you seem incapable of any rational argument, I&#39;m not expecting you even to try.


Can&#39;t say I&#39;ve looked at much of it. It&#39;s probably better than shit like a "black square".

As long as you&#39;re okay with appreciating facist art-work, that&#39;s fine with me. Just further exposes you as the reactionary you so evidently are.


QUOTE
Er... but you said you hated subjective expression in art?&#33;?&#33;

No where did I say anything like this. This came from your imagination and nowhere else.

Well you said this:


The tendency toward "subjective, non-representational , abstract" art is bourgeois in itself.


I&#39;m sure Marx and Engels didn&#39;t have art in mind

Haha&#33; That&#39;s just plain wrong - in Marx&#39;s formulation of the base-superstructure analogy art is part of the superstructure.


QUOTE
Socialist or Soviet Realism on the other hand is not based on material reality - it is painted in accord with pre-conceived and prescribed ideals.

More meaningless bullshit.

No it&#39;s not - your poor comprehension skills just aren&#39;t up to it. Soviet Realism didn&#39;t attempt to record material societal reality. The only art that was tolerated was produced by artists who had undergone rigorous indoctrination in artistic method at academies and who were members of unions that kept a close eye on their activity. They were trained to depict idealised images of Soviet leaders and utopian images of labour and society (which had little or no relationship with reality). i.e. the process of artistic production is alienated (and to a more totalising extent than under market economies).


You don&#39;t like it because it doesn&#39;t conform to your anti-communist interpretation of history, in other words?

That doesn&#39;t make much sense - what you&#39;ve written would mean that I don&#39;t like Soviet Realism because it&#39;s so &#39;wonderful&#39; or &#39;progressive&#39; and therefore doesn&#39;t &#39;conform&#39; to my analysis of the USSR as a reactionary hell-hole that bled the workers white... I&#39;m merely interested in why Soviet Realism is so grotesque and, furthermore, in applying a historically materialist approach to that art (base-superstructure, remember?)


QUOTE
Illegitimate, do you not consider idealism, voluntarism and individualism all to be characteristic of bourgeois ideology? If not, perhaps you should be debating this in Opposing Ideologies...

I&#39;m not the one spewing shit about "subjective expression in art."

Er - the only time I think I talked about subjective expression was with reference to the Surrealists (who you apparently find &#39;interesting&#39;). You have not been able however to refute rational allegations of supporting various elements of bourgeois ideology - such as idealism and individualism, so sickly expressed in Soviet Realism.


In other words, your bullshit analysis of socialist realism is just another way to vent your hatred of the USSR and Stalin. That much was obvious from the beginning.

Partly.


This is funny, because you admit exactly what I said in my paragraph: that artists are still constrained in what they paint in bourgeoisie society if they paint things no one wants to buy.

Yes... why that&#39;s funny I don&#39;t understand. Under Stalinism artists were much more constrained and alienated. In the West some artists - with some success - resisted the alienation of the market. In the USSR they would have been (and were) purged.


I could ask the same of you, because alienation isn&#39;t about the creation of art. It is about workers and commodity production.

Yes it is. Art is produced, just like any other human activity that externalises thought. It&#39;s when the individual looses autonomous control over his own production that it becomes alienated. Under capitalism the form that these alienated produce take is commodities. And, in case you hadn&#39;t noticed, art in capitalism is a commodity. Your grasp of theory is so inadequate I suggest you make fewer groundless assertions.


Don&#39;t forgot the CIA funding.

The CIA funded abstract expressionism after the War, so as to promote Western ideology. I have nowhere in my posts supported (or for that matter even mentioned&#33;) such art. Your insinuation that the CIA would have supported Dadaists or Situationists is... amusing. As revolutionaries many avant-garde artists were under surveillance. (Mind you that&#39;s preferable than what they would have faced in the USSR, I hazard to guess.)


So. It&#39;s a good thing the USSR didn&#39;t support artists who drew shit like a "black square." That they didn&#39;t support anything but socialist realism doesn&#39;t bother me either.

Just because you (with your egocentric, individualist and idealist outlook) don&#39;t appreciate certain art-work doesn&#39;t mean artists shouldn&#39;t be allowed to create&#33; That&#39;s just plain totalitarian (and alienating).


Translation: I hate Stalin, therefore this painting is bad.

Translation: Intelligitmate has no rational argument and can only resort to groundless and emotional assertions.

[Operation Red Flag]

I feel you may be over-analysing art here RevolverNo9. It may be an interest to you but many Socialists would feel it to be unrelated to class struggle. Also, how does the state of art in Soviet Russia reflect on Stalin&#39;s leadership?

ORF

[Intelligitimate]

So... you can&#39;t refute anything I&#39;ve written.

There is nothing to refute. You hate Stalin and the USSR, and even Lenin, therefore, socialist realism is bad.


As long as you&#39;re okay with appreciating facist art-work, that&#39;s fine with me. Just further exposes you as the reactionary you so evidently are.

So you only like what, bourgeois CIA funded pieces of abstract shit? What don&#39;t you tell us, Mr. Art Critic, what is good art that us communists should appreciate?


Well you said this:

Which is clearly different.


Haha&#33; That&#39;s just plain wrong - in Marx&#39;s formulation of the base-superstructure analogy art is part of the superstructure.

Feel free to quote Marx on art then.


No it&#39;s not - your poor comprehension skills just aren&#39;t up to it.

No, you cloak your anti-communist art criticism in vague gibberish on purpose, because if you said it clearly it would look like the stupid shit it is.


That doesn&#39;t make much sense - what you&#39;ve written would mean that I don&#39;t like Soviet Realism because it&#39;s so &#39;wonderful&#39; or &#39;progressive&#39; and therefore doesn&#39;t &#39;conform&#39; to my analysis of the USSR as a reactionary hell-hole that bled the workers white.

No, your anti-communist reactionary interpretation of history is what informs your shitty analysis of Soviet art.


Er - the only time I think I talked about subjective expression was with reference to the Surrealists (who you apparently find &#39;interesting&#39;). You have not been able however to refute rational allegations of supporting various elements of bourgeois ideology - such as idealism and individualism, so sickly expressed in Soviet Realism.

You haven&#39;t shown socialist realism has anything to do with idealism or individualism, you&#39;ve merely spewed it. What would you prefer, Mr. Art Critic? More black fucking squares?


Partly.

Totally. You&#39;re just another worthless petty-bourgeois pseudo-socialist who hates everything about actually existing socialism because it doesn&#39;t live up to your utopian ideals. Hence your hatred of socialist realism.


In the West some artists - with some success - resisted the alienation of the market.

Many with CIA funding.


Yes it is.

No it isn&#39;t. Art doesn&#39;t fit into commodity production in a way that Marx&#39;s concept of alienation could apply to it, because there is no capitalist involved in the process of its creation. The capitalist literally owns the labor process. When the worker makes a product, it is the capitalist&#39;s product, not theirs. They are alienated from their own labor. This is not the case with art creation.


Your grasp of theory is so inadequate I suggest you make fewer groundless assertions.

It is yours that needs work. Your conception of alienation is bullshit. Alienation doesn&#39;t produce commodities, that is absolutely and utterly retarded. People made commodities before capitalism existed in this world. Alienation is about ownership of the labor creating process.


Just because you (with your egocentric, individualist and idealist outlook) don&#39;t appreciate certain art-work doesn&#39;t mean artists shouldn&#39;t be allowed to create&#33; That&#39;s just plain totalitarian (and alienating).

That is a laugh, coming from a comitted hater of the USSR and actually existing socialism, as all socialist hatred of the USSR is rooted in idealist bullshit.

What do you mean by "allowed to create?" You think anyone should be supported who calls themselves an artist and draws "black squares?" Such shit never happens in the real world, in socialist or capitalist countries. If you don&#39;t create art other people want to look at, be it a socialist government or rich capitalists, you aren&#39;t gonna make a living out of it, plain and simple.


Translation: Intelligitmate has no rational argument and can only resort to groundless and emotional assertions.

Translation: I don&#39;t find what Intelligitimate says convincing because it isn&#39;t filled with enough post-modernist style jargon and isn&#39;t anti-communist.

[apathy maybe]

Obviously I cannot be bothered actually reading this thread. But I thought that I would pop and post a gem.

Obviously this "art" in the USSR was not art as it was not rebelling against the status quo.

Authentic art rebels against states and oppression. It is an example of freedom.

[Raubleaux]

RevolverNo9, could you please quote the passages from Marx that contribute to your understanding of what "base-superstructure" means? I suspect you have a Bukharinist understanding of "base-superstructure," not a Marxist one.

[Raubleaux]

For those interested in learning something substantive about art in the Soviet Union should check out "Art Education in the USSR," a series of articles by Ralph G. Beelke in the journal Art Education in the early 1960s.

RevolverNo9, your point is a pretty uninteresting one to me. While I am a great lover of music (which underwent a renaissance in the USSR), I am not particularly interested in paintings and don&#39;t know much at all about them.

It seems to me though that communist countries have placed a great deal more importance on art, music, and sports than non-communist ones. Look at the cultural flourishing that occurs to this day in Cuba, for example. They have so many famous authors and artists, and always win an incredibly high number of Olympic gold medals.

The same was true of the USSR. Look at the cultural revival that occured in Russia and lasted well on through the Stalin period -- due in no small part to Stalin&#39;s policy on nationalities, which led to the cultural growth and enrichment of all the Soviet Union&#39;s many diverse people. The nationalities policy of the USSR was a major reason for the popular support enjoyed by the government.

Everything I have read about the Soviet Union has suggested to me that art, music, and sports were greatly improved and flourished as the result of Soviet Power. As I said, it&#39;s not something I am particularly interested in, but what you are saying doesn&#39;t make sense to me.

[Herman]

I don&#39;t see how Socialist Realism has to do with Stalin or his policies.

[Janus]

I don&#39;t see how Socialist Realism has to do with Stalin or his policies.
It was the officiallly approved art of the USSR so it was used by Stalin and the state as a tool to further their goals whether it be to garner support for something or glorify the leader.

[Herman]

It was the officiallly approved art of the USSR so it was used by Stalin and the state as a tool to further their goals whether it be to garner support for something or glorify the leader.

I know what it was, but I think Stalin simply used it to give the worker&#39;s a more revolutionary conciousness.

[tambourine_man]

(intelligitimate)

That is the only thing anyone in this thread is doing, except you want to pretend your bullshit preferences are somehow objective, by rooting them in anti-Stalinism, and by extension, anti-communism.

no, i stated some facts and made reference to a few paintings. i certainly am anti-stalinist, though that hardly implies that i&#39;m anti-communist. but let&#39;s get over it anyway.



A "black square" doesn&#39;t express shit.


on the other hand, a black square expresses everything.
i would suggest reading malevich&#39;s manifesto "the non-objective world." or, if you are short on time, here is an excerpt i just found. it is pretty concise and clear.
http://www.rollins.edu/Foreign_Lang/Russian/suprem.html
i will try to paraphrase:
without referencing what is called "objective reality" and without surrendering his personal vision to bourgeois conventionality, aesthetics, etc., malevich was able to minimalize the transition from pure subjective emotion to painted canvas, hence the black square as a direct, unadultered, visceral expression of personality - art.


Still more meaningless crap.

why is it meaningless? i explained its meaning clearly. what don&#39;t you understand?


Alienation is a phenomenon that occurs in capitalist commodity production. If you want to treat making art in a similar fashion to commodity production, there were no buyers for shit like a "black square" in the USSR. Why should an artist expect to make a living by painting shit no one wants? This is no different in bourgeois countries, yet I don&#39;t hear you screaming about artistic oppression because most artists can&#39;t make a living at it.


i don&#39;t understand your argument? of course i do not believe that anybody enjoys real freedom in the bourgeois democracies, and man is certainly alienated there also..but wasn&#39;t the topic of this dicussion "art in the USSR" ??
are you trying to make an argument that life in the USSR, in terms of actual freedom (i.e. man is no longer alienated and can truly express his personality in his production, whatever and however that may be. freedom from compulsory labor, etc.), was not much different than life in the bourgeois democracies? because then we are in agreement...
of course, in the bourgeois democracies, too, man&#39;s expressions are regulated by a dominant ideological machine, and artistic creation thus becomes an alienated sphere of activity rather than a natural expression of life...
unlike you, apparently, i believe that such a way of things should be changed.



I don&#39;t like all surrealist art, but I find its strangeness often fascinating.

well so do i. but uncle joe certainly didn&#39;t feel that way; socialist realist theory is almost completely opposite to surrealism. i guess subjective, anti-rational art can be pretty okay afterall huh?

[PRC-UTE]

The USSR produced the greatest art ever, and I don&#39;t mean socialist realism. Google russian constructivism or El Lizzitsky.

[RevolverNo9]

Operation Red Flag:


I feel you may be over-analysing art here RevolverNo9. It may be an interest to you but many Socialists would feel it to be unrelated to class struggle. Also, how does the state of art in Soviet Russia reflect on Stalin&#39;s leadership?

There&#39;s no over-analysation involved whatsoever. I&#39;m not suggesting for a moment that art is an essential element in the class-struggle. But a Marxian analysis of art can render interesting and useful material. Art, as the expression of the conscious mind, reflects the economic relations of Stalin&#39;s Russia - being detremins social consciousness.

Intelligitimate:


There is nothing to refute. You hate Stalin and the USSR, and even Lenin, therefore, socialist realism is bad.

:lol: Er, that doesn&#39;t actually constitute an arguement: that&#39;s an assertion. Until you can refute a historical point in my essay, that material stands.


So you only like what, bourgeois CIA funded pieces of abstract shit? What don&#39;t you tell us, Mr. Art Critic, what is good art that us communists should appreciate?

As I&#39;ve said at least once before (are your reading skills up to this?) I don&#39;t particularly like Abstract Expressionism - the art that the CIA funded. I&#39;m not going to tell you what art you can appreciate or not - if you like fascist and idealist art that&#39;s fine by me, I just think you&#39;d be better off recongnising its origin.


Feel free to quote Marx on art then.

Like this you mean?: &#39;In studying such transformations it is always necessary to distinguish between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production, which can be determined with the precision of a natural science, and the legal, political, religious, artistic or philisophic - in short ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out.&#39; - Preface (To A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy)

:lol:


You haven&#39;t shown socialist realism has anything to do with idealism or individualism, you&#39;ve merely spewed it.

Individualism is hard to dispute: endless depictions of Stalin and Lenin in heavily idealised forms. (I give examples in my essay) The elevation of the importance of the individual was endemic in Soviet society and this was reflected in Soviet art. Any genuine Marxist would be disgusted by such things.

The idealism is evident in the depictions of life in an immaterial fashion - scenes of labour and &#39;glorious leaders&#39; are informed by mental ideas about how society should look rather than by observations of material reality.


You&#39;re just another worthless petty-bourgeois pseudo-socialist who hates everything about actually existing socialism because it doesn&#39;t live up to your utopian ideals.

I&#39;m not a utopian - I just believe that, you know, a workers&#39; republic should be controlled by the workers? Or is that just too radical? (Anyway this is another matter.)


QUOTE
In the West some artists - with some success - resisted the alienation of the market.


Many with CIA funding.

None with Western funding - the avant-gard were antagonistic to capitalism, unlike the voluntarist works of abstract expressionism.


They are alienated from their own labor. This is not the case with art creation.

Yes it is. The demands of the market place preclude the possibility of autonomous creation - which is the goal of communism.


People made commodities before capitalism existed in this world. Alienation is about ownership of the labor creating process.

And alienation was contingent before capitalism. Commodities don&#39;t exist to fulfil the needs and desires of man but to serve the interests of the owners of the means of production.


You think anyone should be supported who calls themselves an artist and draws "black squares?" Such shit never happens in the real world, in socialist or capitalist countries.

Anyone who wants to create art should be free to do so. And you&#39;re right: such &#39;shit&#39; has not and never will happen in societies where commodity production reigns (West or East).


Translation: I don&#39;t find what Intelligitimate says convincing because it isn&#39;t filled with enough post-modernist style jargon and isn&#39;t anti-communist.

You should understand what terminology means before you use it. You can&#39;t point towards one example of post-modernist thought in my posts (and you won&#39;t try either: you&#39;ll just construct one of your oh-so-rational arguments that reads a bit like this: &#39;Uhhh - bullshit - yeah, shit, er, Stalin&#33;&#39;)

Apathy Maybe:


Obviously I cannot be bothered actually reading this thread.

Which is probably why your post was so insightful...


Obviously this "art" in the USSR was not art as it was not rebelling against the status quo.

Authentic art rebels against states and oppression. It is an example of freedom.

You&#39;re right that Soviet-Realism didn&#39;t rebel against the status-quo... but that doesn&#39;t mean that it&#39;s not art. There is some relevence to what you say in that meaningful artistic creation must be unfettered.

Raubleaux:


RevolverNo9, could you please quote the passages from Marx that contribute to your understanding of what "base-superstructure" means? I suspect you have a Bukharinist understanding of "base-superstructure," not a Marxist one.

Hah&#33; Please do elaborate. At the risk of sounding like a broken record: &#39;In studying such transformations it is always necessary to distinguish between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production, which can be determined with the precision of a natural science, and the legal, political, religious, artistic or philisophic - in short ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out.&#39; - Preface (To A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy)

It&#39;s quite simple: being determines consciouness.


RevolverNo9, your point is a pretty uninteresting one to me. While I am a great lover of music (which underwent a renaissance in the USSR), I am not particularly interested in paintings and don&#39;t know much at all about them.

Well your personal predilictions are your problem, not mine.


Everything I have read about the Soviet Union has suggested to me that art, music, and sports were greatly improved and flourished as the result of Soviet Power. As I said, it&#39;s not something I am particularly interested in, but what you are saying doesn&#39;t make sense to me.

Sport flourished - it was seen as a way to exhibit the glorious, voluntarist ethic of &#39;socialist man&#39; (I deal with this in my essay). But - seriously - you are joking? A musical and artistic renaissance&#33; (I&#39;ve only heard one piece of Soviet music - a genuine contender for the most painful strain of sound I&#39;ve come across). Artistic experimentation did indeed flair after the revolution. The bureacrats, however, had other ideas. (Feel free to read my essay and dispute any of the historical data if you will.)

RedHerman


I know what it was, but I think Stalin simply used it to give the worker&#39;s a more revolutionary conciousness.

If by &#39;revolutionary consciousness&#39; you mean &#39;acceptance of the status-quo&#39;... then yes.

REPOMAN


The USSR produced the greatest art ever, and I don&#39;t mean socialist realism. Google russian constructivism or El Lizzitsky.

I quite agree. Our friend Intelligitimate here however thinks it&#39;s bourgeois &#39;bullshit&#39; that no working class man could ever appreciate. :rolleyes: (Be careful&#33; You&#39;re getting above your station&#33;)