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hala > RUSSIA Culture and the Arts > Flashcards

RUSSIA Culture and the Arts Flashcards

1
Q

What did Lenin think about culture?

A

Vital but subordinate to class conflict and the retention of power

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2
Q

What were Lenin’s personal cultural tastes?

A

Conservative, with a liking for classical Russian conflict

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3
Q

What did Lenin implement early after the seizure of power to support and encourage artists?

A

Commissariat of Englightenment

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4
Q

Prolekult

A

‘Proletarian Culture’

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5
Q

What was prolekult a direct challenge to?

A

High culture

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6
Q

When did the government start to impose restrictions on prolekult?

A

By the early 1920s

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7
Q

Why did the government begin to impose restrictions on prolekult?

A

They were concerned at the variety of viewpoints expressed through this culture from the people

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8
Q

Who promoted the prolekult originally?

A

Alexander Bogdanov; Anatoly Lunacharsky

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9
Q

What was a key strand of prolekult?

A

Constructivists

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10
Q

What was the emphasis of the Constructivists to be on?

A

The collective of the workers as a class, rather than individualism

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11
Q

Constructivists

A

Wished to create a new proletarian culture based on the worker and industrial technology

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12
Q

Why did the Bolsheviks put so much emphasis on visual art?

A

The country had low literacy rates

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13
Q

What was the RAPP replaced with?

A

Union of Soviet Writers

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14
Q

When was the RAPP replaced?

A

1932

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15
Q

What marked the end of the Cultural Revolution?

A

The replacement of the RAPP with the Union of Soviet Writers

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16
Q

What did Stalin call writers and artists?

A

‘Engineers of human souls’

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17
Q

Which cultural movement followed the cultural revolution?

A

Socialist Realism

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18
Q

Socialist Realism

A

Presented idealised images of life under socialism to inspire the population towards its achievement

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19
Q

Who policed Socialist Realism?

A

Union of Soviet Writers

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20
Q

Who is an example of a writer who conformed to the rules of Socialist Realism but whose work suffered as a result of this?

A

Mikhail Zoshchenko

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21
Q

Who are examples of writers who fed into the ‘genre of silence’ during the Socialist Realism movement?

A

Boris Pasternak; Anna Akhamatova

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22
Q

What was art like under Socialist Realism?

A

No experimentation with form; avant-garde styles were rejected

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23
Q

What was Socialist Realist art often fused with?

A

Cult of personality

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24
Q

What was literature like under Socialist Realism?

A

Change of emphasis away from the cult of the ‘little man’ to heroes connected to the Party

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25
What was the standard plot of novels in the 1930s?
A hero from the people was guided by the Party to greater things
26
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
27
What ensured that the population had easy access to literature under Socialist Realism?
Low price of 'lowbrow' books; tenfold growth in library acquisitions
28
Which musical instrument did the Soviet government ban in the 1940s?
Saxophone
29
Under Socialist Realsim, what did the government favour in popular music?
Military songs more than jazz
30
Why did the Soviet government fear jazz music in the 1930-40s?
Its perceived decadent associations
31
What did music suffer from under Socialist Realism?
Pressure to toe the line
32
What style of architecture did Socialist Realism promote?
'Stalinist Baroque'
33
What was 'Stalinist Baroque' architecture better known as?
'Wedding cake' architecture
34
What did 'Stalinist Baroque' architecture make use of?
Classical lines
35
What are the best examples of 'Stalinist Baroque' architecture?
Moscow University; Moscow metro system
36
When was Moscow University rebuilt?
After 1945
37
When was Socialist Realism popular?
1920-60s
38
Which popular Socialist Realist film presented the heroic version of the storming of the Winter Palace in 1917?
Eisenstein's 'October' (1927)
39
What was shocking about the production of Eisenstein's 'October'?
More people died in the making of the film than in the actual events themselves
40
How was cinema used during WW2?
To promote patriotism in defence of both Mother Russia and socialism
41
What was one of the most popular wartime Russian films?
'Alexander Nevsky'
42
Why is it easy to criticise Socialist Realism?
It was so out of touch with reality
43
What were the positives of Socialist Realism?
Inspired some people to work harder; provided escapism
44
When were there signs that the government was prepared to allow artists and writers greater freedom?
Immediately after WW2
45
What is an example of artists and writers being given greater freedom?
Boris Pasternak and Anna Akhamatova were allowed to give public readings of their unorthodox poetry in Moscow in 1946
46
When was a campaign launched to remove all aspects of 'bourgeois' culture from the West?
1946
47
How were the signs of greater freedom quickly dispelled post-WW2?
Elements of Western culture were condemned in a campaign referred to as the Zhdanovschina
48
What provided hope for artists and writers who wished to express themselves freely?
De-Stalinisation
49
What is an example of Khrushchev's more relaxed approach to culture and the arts?
Works by Isaac Babel, a writer who had been shot during the purges, were published
50
When did jazz music make a reappearence?
Under Khrushchev
51
What new themes did writers begin to explore under Khrushchev?
Spiritual concerns; bleakness of rural life; problems of adultery, divorce and alcohol abuse
52
When was nonconformity starting to have an important impact on youth culture in the USSR?
By the late 1950s
53
What were the youth groups who listened to pop and rock'n'roll music and wore Western fashions labelled by the authorities?
Stilyagi
54
What was tape recorder self-publishing called?
Magnitizdat
55
What was a notable development in popular music under Khrushchev?
Guitar-poet
56
Who was the leading figure of the guitar-poets?
Alexander Galich
57
What did the guitar-poet often address?
Feelings of the individual
58
Who did the guitar-poet often speak to?
Socially alienated
59
How did the replacement of Khrushchev with Brezhnev affect culture and the arts?
Narrowed the boundaries of what was acceptable after the cultural thaw of the Khrushchev years
60
Why did many artists and writers find that it was easier to work in the new cultural climate created by Brezhnev?
More certainty over what was permissible
61
When did Soviet culture become conservative?
1970s
62
Which school of village prose, made popular under Brezhnev, highlighted the value of a simple rural life?
Derevenshchiki
63
Who emerged as an influential guitar-poet during the Brezhnev years?
Vladimir Vysotsky
64
What were Vladimir Vysotsky's songs about?
Sex and delinquency
65
What indicated the growing alienation of young people from Soviet society in the Brezhnev years?
Outpouring of grief at Vladimir Vysotsky's funeral in 1980
66
What was the government's control over record production and radio airtime during the Brezhnev years undermined by?
Development of the cassette recorder
67
When did a Soviet audience become skilled at grasping subtext?
In the Brezhnev years
68
What were the limits of Khrushchev's cultural thaw shown by?
Treatment of Boris Pasternak over his novel 'Doctor Zhivago'
69
What was Pasternak awarded for 'Doctor Zhivago'?
1958 Nobel Prize for Literature
70
What was an area of art in which nonconformity was not encouraged by Khrushchev?
Abstract art
71
What type of music did Khrushchev have a problem with?
Jazz
72
Who was employed to patrol the streets and dance halls to report on young people whose behaviour was deemed unacceptable?
Komsomol groups
73
When did the government hold a conference that decided on which dance moves were permissible?
1961
74
How did Khrushchev's cultural policy reflect his personality?
Subject to mood swings
75
When did Khrushchev become less tolerant of cultural nonconformity?
In his last months as leader
76
What indicated that there were limits to what Brezhnev's government was prepared to tolerate?
The trial of Joseph Brodsky, 1964
77
What was Brodsky sentenced to?
Five years of hard labour in prison
78
Due to the campaigning of fellow writers abroad and at home, how long was Brodsky actually imprisoned for?
2 years
79
Why was Brodsky arrested?
He was not licensed as a poet under the Writers' Union
80
What is an example of a further clampdown from Brezhnev on cultural nonconformity?
The trial of Andrei Sinyavsky and Yuli Daniel, 1966
81
What were the clashes between nonconformist artists and the government the cause of in the West?
Much bad publicity for the Soviet Union
82
How were nonconformist artists often viewed by the general public?
Self-indulgent; out of touch with the harsh realities of daily life
83
How much airtime did the government agree to give to songs not composed by official Soviet composers in the 1980s?
20%
84
Why did propaganda and control over culture become so important?
Use of terror lessened

hala (21 decks)

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