the Communist revolutionaries promised a world that was not only more just and prosperous but also a more beautiful world when the party leadership attained a unique position of total power from which it began to reorganize the whole of economic social and everyday life it became a kind of artist whose material was the whole world and there was no risk of merely repeating the idealist dreams of the old order as the party Elite set itself apart from the old World in two major ways first through its knowledge particularly the knowledge that the world is elastic and that everything that is considered stable and immutable can be changed if only one keeps in mind the dialectic of Bas and superr structure and second through the unique position of total power over a society which enabled them to gain an overarching view of the whole Critics on the other hand could only occupy particular positions in society and their criticism represented only a one-sided view that originated from the remnants of the old social order in this unique historical situation the perspective of power and aesthetic distance coincide but which art style was adequate for the new world to come after the Civil War more and more artists put forward the ideas revolutionary realism suprematism constructivism productivism futur ISM and so on but only one of them was chosen by the all powerful artist this video will focus on two of the most famous art styles of the Soviet Union the art of the Russian avangard and socialist realism needless to say that both art forms cannot be adequately represented in their complexity in this short video nonetheless I will try to capture their basic Spirit as it is presented in Boris Cy's book the total art of Stalin ISM one of the main motives of the avangard movement was the radical break with what it saw as the old art tradition according to their definition all traditional art was merely an imitation of Nature and aimed to represent the world in different ways the new art on the other hand was not supposed to represent the world but to transform it the avangard movement was a reaction to the massive intrusion of Technology into the European life in the 19th century many artists and philosophers saw God and His creation replaced by modern technology the death or murder of God shattered the unity of the world it opened up the Horizon and allowed the Black Chaos of infinite possibilities to flood in the Russian avangard was determined to accelerate this process however contrary to what is often maintained they did not welcome modernity but Det tested it the artists of the avangard followed a tendency in Russian philosophy to adopt radical philosophies from the West such as shellings religious Renaissance or nich's death of God and radicalized them even further they wanted to put an end to the destructive process of technological progress by radicalizing it there is no going back and only by moving forward can modernity be overcome in the words of Fredick n was often quoted by the avangard that which is falling deserves to be pushed today the idea that the intensification of technological innovation will lead to a Breaking Point is known as accelerationism the most famous work of art of the avanguard is kazimir malevich's black Square it symbolizes the nothingness to which progress is heading a point zero that coincides with the primordial substance of the universe kazimir malevich saw his own artistic career from impressionism to cubism and from futurism to suprematism as the culmination of art history malevich succeeded in overcoming the traditional mematic image that had emerged in Greek Antiquity suprematism founded by malich in 1913 was intended to overcome the representational and physical world in favor of pure artistic feeling the founding work of suprem matism was the black Square which was originally part of an avangard opera called victory over the Sun for malich it was unacceptable that the light of the sun could dictate to him as an artist what and how he had to see the light of the sun had to be completely replaced by artificial light in this sense the victory over the sun was also a victory over the Dying God the black Square was what remained after the sun had gotten extinct and symbolized the ultimate Point Z of Creation The avangard Artist believed that his knowledge of and especially participation in the murder of God gave him theurgic magical power over the world and he was convinced that by thus crossing the boundaries of the world he could discover the laws that govern Cosmic and social forces he would then regenerate himself and the World by mastering these laws like an engineer haling its decline through artistic tick techniques as part of this process the old culture had to be destroyed the black Square was like an open window through which the Revolutionary spirits of radical destruction could enter the space of culture and reduce it to ashes after 5 years of Civil War left the Russian Empire in ruins the members of the avangard thought that a point zero had been reached most of them immediately joined the Bolsheviks and tried to secure influential positions in inside the party Marxism leninism had some similarities with the worldview of the avangard marxists saw capitalism as a destructive force that melts everything solid into air but that will eventually perish due to its own inner logic and be replaced by a completely new world yet when it came to Art their opinions diverged particularly the older generation of Bolsheviks had a rather traditional understanding of art when malich heard that some members of the party made plans to save the museums in the midst of the destruction of the Civil War he vehemently protested everything old had to be reduced to ashes in contrast the main position of the Bolshevik party was rather pragmatic seize the cultural heritage of the bisi keep that which is useful and can be given to the proletariat and sell the rest to the decadent Bazi in capitalist countries irrespective of these differences the B initially welcomed the aard artists they sought the support of artists and generally tried to secure as much support as possible from the old intelligencia especially in the first years when the bolik party was hopelessly underst stuffed the avangard on the other hand saw the Bolsheviks as a transitional tool for their own plans they turned radically against their rivals in the party and tried to denounce them as counterrevolutionaries but as the regime stabilized more and more members of the old intelligencia joined the party and began to outnumber the avangard in addition artists who were more associated with traditional Styles such as the proletarian writers gained influence in 1932 Stalin declared that from now on only one art form that is socialist realism was appropriate to represent the Socialist future and all of the former organizations of artists were replaced by a single state controlled Union of artists the artists of the avangard saw socialist realism as a step backwards while the Socialist realists saw themselves as saviors from the barbarism of the avangard for them the art of the avangard was an undialectical negation of the past based on idealistic and metaphysical thinking the Socialist realists wanted to preserve parts of the classical Heritage but from another perspective socialist realism was the Fulfillment of the dream of the avangard by other means stalinist art was a monolithic political project aimed at creating a new world it was an amalgamation of the various historical art forms but was itself post-historical and as such Beyond old and new and it was completely free there was no Art Market in the Soviet Union and the Socialist realists had no competition it was everything that the avangard dreamed of the main aim of socialist realism was to capture the typical but not as a simple reflection of the world at least not in the old sense firstly it was not the things that were to be represented but their Essence that was to be captured by the artists and secondly the typical was not the empirical meeme but rather that which is in the process of creation a good definition was given in malankov's report of the 19th party Congress as our artists writers and performers create their artistic images they must constantly bear in mind that the typical is not that which is encountered the most often but that which most persuasively expresses the essence of a given social force from the Marxist leninist standpoint the typical does not signify some sort of statistical mean the typical is the vital sphere in which is manifested the party Spirit of realistic art the question of the typical is always a political question as in avangard theory Aesthetics and politics are identical artists had to look at the world politically and capture the new world that was being built by the party only the writers painters and filmmakers who maintained close contacts with the party Elite could be sure that their Works accurately represented the new reality and would not be considered counterrevolutionary the artists were granted this act access to the inner Circles of the party not as some kind of bribery just as everyone else in the Soviet Union they could be made to work by simple intimidation no it was necessary for their craft how were they supposed to depict the typical of the world to come if they had no access to the minds of the creators of this new world but if an artist with access to the party would prove to be unable to portray the right idea of the typical It could only mean that there was a political disagreement with the general line of the party on a subconscious Level under these circumstances to be a realist means to avoid being shot for the political crime of allowing one's personal dream to differ from stalins to a spectator who judges the artworks of socialist realism according to the traditional criteria of realist art they must appear inferior and as simply bad art but to the drain Vier of the stalinist period who was familiar with the relevant codes these works of art appeared complex and Sublime and they offered him an aesthetic experience of terror since it was known that incorrect coding could mean political or even real death for the artist initially most Bolsheviks assumed that the change in material conditions in the Soviet Union would create a new Consciousness however the economy of the Soviet Union in the stalinist period lagged behind the West and most of the technology had to be imported from Western countries moreover Consciousness seemed to be far less plastic than expected but if the material conditions lacked behind the West the advanced sovet Consciousness was the only guarantee for the construction of socialism and the superiority of the Soviet Union consequently in the stalinist period the emphasis shifted to the Iron Will of the proletariat and the new consciousness of the Socialist man as the Soviet writer and journalist IIA Arenberg wrote although we may have borrowed the model for a tractor from the United States our tractor dri is certainly a man the world has never seen before the literary Heroes of the stalinist period followed this logic and even began to display some limited superhuman abilities due to their socialist approach to life they were able to cure tuberculosis by willpower alone raise tropical plants in the open air of the tundra paralyzed the enemies with the power of the gays and so on the stenov movement was also part of this ideology named after the worker Alexa stenov who allegedly set a record by extracting 14 times the normal amount of coal in a single shift it became a symbol of Unleashed proletarian power nothing is impossible for a Bolshevik was a common slogan that accompanied orders to fulfill impossible quotas but but the force that was able to create a new world also had another destructive side somehow the enemy managed to infiltrate every village in the Soviet Union every institution every Factory and even the secret police and sabotage the Communist project in all parts of the country loyal and well-known Communists suddenly turned out to be monsters capable of demoniacal spontaneous and unprovoked Malice and violence Trotsky became the miror image of the new man he possessed almost diabolical powers of Destruction the heroes of socialist realism as well as their demonic doppelgangers were incarnations of these creative and destructive forces unlike avangard art socialist realism attempted to embody these forces in more traditional forms this lend the stories a kind of Otherworldly flavor sometimes it seems as if these stories were meant to give these forces a human pH by inventing biographies human habits phomes and so on the heroes almost seem to be in the employ of some sort of extraterrestrial Bureau planning a trip to Earth they want to make their envoice as anthropomorphic as possible but they cannot keep the otherworldly void from gaping through all the cracks in the mask in this respect socialist realism has some similarities with surrealism which emerged around the same time and Salvador the Ali for his part was fascinated by Lenin and Stalin stalinist art spread around the world at the same time as American mass culture Coca-Cola jeans Burgers nylon stockings cars Hollywood musicals television and so on all of these products and their advertisement symbolized the superiority of the western lifestyle Soviet art and Soviet propaganda posters were also turned into advertisement advertising was a St forming element for both kinds of mass cultures but other than the West the Soviet Union produced only one product that mattered communism the stalinist culture was one huge advertising campaign for the Communist future and the target audience was the whole world in this sense it was closer to Western commercial advertising than to the propaganda of the Nazis that only targeted one people just as everyone was called on to buy Big Max everyone was called on to buy the Soviet version of Communism and as in Western advertising the focus was not always on a specific product but on a certain lifestyle and here again socialist realism fulfilled the dreams of the avangard artists who always insisted that their art would not only produce traditional works of art but a lifestyle a lifestyle for the whole of society a short anecdote tells how Stalin made sure that the advertising campaigns did not deviate from the idealized image of the Soviet lifestyle in the 1930s a meeting room was to be set up in one of Stalin's numerous stes for traveling party members the interior designer suggested covering the chairs with real leather but Stalin refused A Bolshevik does not sit on real leather like a Bourgeois instead artificial leather should be used to emphasize communist modesty the architect objected that real leather cost much less in Russia than artificial leather which had to be imported from the West for expensive foreign currency yet Stalin replied that no expense was to be spared for the lifestyle of communist modesty there were long discussions about how Soviet people and even animals should be portrayed correctly before a particular form of realism was agreed on this realism of Soviet advertisement had more to do with photography than classical paintings and was only drawn by hand because computer technology was not yet invented and often the pictures were supposed to look like photographs from the future the Communist future in summary it can be said that in the stalinist period a consistently modern and utopian art on its natural end as advertisement for itself and the society that promotes outet