Art and Culture

Question 1

Summarise Lenin’s attitude to art.

Answer 1

1. Proletkult + avant garde
2. End of Proletkult + re-emphasis on traditional arts
3. Consistent use of cinema and photography for propaganda

Question 2

Why did Lenin terminate Proletkult?

Answer 2

1. Lenin argued culture should be universal and shouldn’t belong to one class (e.g just the proletariat)
2. Work produced was too avant-garde for working people to understand
3. Proletkult was independent from party control

Question 3

Lenin : Art + Propaganda

Who made simple graphic posters supporting the communist regime during the civil war?

Answer 3

Vladimir Mayakovsky

Question 4

Lenin : Art + Propaganda

Who was the most famous avant-garde photographer, who used techniques such as photomontage to make posters celebrating the revolution?

Answer 4

Alexander Rodchenko

Question 5

Lenin : Art + Propaganda

Who was an experimental film-maker who used experimental techniques such as slow motion to produce Communist documentary films called Kino-Pravda.

Answer 5

Dziga Vertov

Question 6

Summarise Stalin’s attitude to art.

Answer 6

1. Social Realism - realistic style + industrial themes

2. Paintings showing government figures (Lenin+Stalin)

Question 7

Summarise Stalin’s attitude to literature.

Answer 7

1. Simple plot that ordinary people could follow

2. Subject related to building socialism

Question 8

Give an example of a celebrated book of the Stalin era.

Answer 8

‘Cement’ by Gladkov, published in 1924

Question 9

Why did Khrushchev introduce cultural thaws?

Answer 9

1. wanted to form an alliance between creative intellectuals
2. wanted to set himself apart from Stalin

Question 10

When were the three cultural thaws?

Answer 10

1. 1953-1954
2. 1956-1957
3. 1961-1962

Question 11

Why did Khrushchev introduce cultural freezes as well as thaws?

Answer 11

• Khrushchev was prepared to tolerate some freedom of expression, but not widespread non-conformity
• during each thaw, artists went further than the government would allow

Question 12

Give an example of thaw artists going too far under one of Khrushchev’s thaws.

Answer 12

• 1954

- Boris Pasternak’s novel Dr Zhivago was critical of Leninism

Question 13

Give an example of how Khrushchev limited freedom of expression.

Answer 13

• ‘style hunters’ and ‘loose women’ in the 1950s and 60s

- propaganda posters accused women following western fashion to be frivolous and sexually promiscuous

Question 14

Give an example of how Brezhnev showed that he had abandoned the cultural liberalisation of the Khrushchev period.

Answer 14

• Show Trials of author Andrei Sinyavsky for producing ‘anti-soviet propaganda’ and sent to a labour camp
• Andrei Sinyavsky had risen to fame under Khrushchev

Question 15

How did Khrushchev challenge non-conformity?

Answer 15

• art/ propaganda posters encouraged ‘popular oversight’

- this encouraged people to challenge non-conformist behaviour such as laziness and alcoholism

Question 16

How successful was Brezhnev at suppressing dissident artists?

Answer 16

• limited success

- although some events were raided by police, many artists worked and took part in secret shows

Question 17

Give an example of dissidents producing illegal art under Brezhnev.

Answer 17

• in the 1970s the Moscow Conceptualists published samizdat literature exposing the dullness of life under the Communists.