RUSSIA Culture and the Arts Flashcards
What did Lenin think about culture?
Vital but subordinate to class conflict and the retention of power
What were Lenin’s personal cultural tastes?
Conservative, with a liking for classical Russian conflict
What did Lenin implement early after the seizure of power to support and encourage artists?
Commissariat of Englightenment
Prolekult
‘Proletarian Culture’
What was prolekult a direct challenge to?
High culture
When did the government start to impose restrictions on prolekult?
By the early 1920s
Why did the government begin to impose restrictions on prolekult?
They were concerned at the variety of viewpoints expressed through this culture from the people
Who promoted the prolekult originally?
Alexander Bogdanov; Anatoly Lunacharsky
What was a key strand of prolekult?
Constructivists
What was the emphasis of the Constructivists to be on?
The collective of the workers as a class, rather than individualism
Constructivists
Wished to create a new proletarian culture based on the worker and industrial technology
Why did the Bolsheviks put so much emphasis on visual art?
The country had low literacy rates
What was the RAPP replaced with?
Union of Soviet Writers
When was the RAPP replaced?
1932
What marked the end of the Cultural Revolution?
The replacement of the RAPP with the Union of Soviet Writers
What did Stalin call writers and artists?
‘Engineers of human souls’
Which cultural movement followed the cultural revolution?
Socialist Realism
Socialist Realism
Presented idealised images of life under socialism to inspire the population towards its achievement
Who policed Socialist Realism?
Union of Soviet Writers
Who is an example of a writer who conformed to the rules of Socialist Realism but whose work suffered as a result of this?
Mikhail Zoshchenko
Who are examples of writers who fed into the ‘genre of silence’ during the Socialist Realism movement?
Boris Pasternak; Anna Akhamatova
What was art like under Socialist Realism?
No experimentation with form; avant-garde styles were rejected
What was Socialist Realist art often fused with?
Cult of personality
What was literature like under Socialist Realism?
Change of emphasis away from the cult of the ‘little man’ to heroes connected to the Party
What was the standard plot of novels in the 1930s?
A hero from the people was guided by the Party to greater things
What was ‘lowbrow’ literature in the 1930s usually concerned with?
Heroes from Russian history; war stories; detective novels where a police agent thwarts the evil capitalists
What ensured that the population had easy access to literature under Socialist Realism?
Low price of ‘lowbrow’ books; tenfold growth in library acquisitions
Which musical instrument did the Soviet government ban in the 1940s?
Saxophone
Under Socialist Realsim, what did the government favour in popular music?
Military songs more than jazz
Why did the Soviet government fear jazz music in the 1930-40s?
Its perceived decadent associations
What did music suffer from under Socialist Realism?
Pressure to toe the line
What style of architecture did Socialist Realism promote?
‘Stalinist Baroque’
What was ‘Stalinist Baroque’ architecture better known as?
‘Wedding cake’ architecture