I'm so crazy I don't know this isn't possible

Let's conquer the virgin blue!
V. Gorlenko, 1964

Sometimes the ideas for Soviet Posters seem to be quite hilarious. Take this one from the sixties. It shows a great number of ducklings, who carry slogans which say: “Let’s conquer the virgin blue!” They are proceeding from a giant egg, moving in a horde like soviet workers at an October demonstration. Their main goal according to the slogans is to live and increase its weight on the water.

In reality lots of soviet young people were cultivating the virgin soils which were considered to be the main source of extensive development of agriculture. At that time lots of “advanced” means were tested like planting of maize corn everywhere including areas near the polar circle, general breeding of rabbits or in this very case the duck farms building, which was considered to be a perfect way of getting plenty of cheap meat for the people.

Needless to say that all the efforts were in vain: the corn didn’t seem to grow according to forecasts, and moreover Soviet people were not eager to choose it instead of wheat bread. The rabbits and ducks although breeding well and fast were prone to epidemics and required lots of food to grow. These were some of the failures in agricultural development which lead to Khrushchev’s forced retirement in 1964.

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Long Live the World October

Long Live the World October
G. Klutsis, 1933

The International Communist Revolution was an idea by Karl Marx mentioned in his Communist Manifesto. He thought that the class struggle would wipe the borders and all workers and peasants would finally live happily in a classless communist society.

The idea of Revolutionary War, which would lead to International Communist Revolution, was based on the assumption that the communists of Russia would be helping their mates abroad to start the fight with world imperialism. At first the plan was as follows: Soviets were suggesting the democratic peace treaty which would end the WW1 to all the parties, and in case it had been turned down the war would have to become Revolutionary War, leading to establishing of communist regimes in Europe.

However, when the peace treaty proposal was rejected by every country except Germany (it agreed to start negotiations), Lenin was to start the War. But he didn't as the army was in poor shape and the economy was collapsing. Certainly Bolsheviks would have lost recently acquired power, as both the workers and peasants would have turned against them in case of another armed conflict, when so many internal problems had yet to be settled.

So despite the opposing Bolsheviks headed by Buharin, the idea of World Communist Revolution had to be postponed.

This poster goes back to 1930, when the chance to spark the Revolution was certainly slipped. However Soviet Union was supporting local communist parties abroad, which were united under Comintern.

The brilliant poster by Gustav Klutsis (who was one of the victims of the Great Purge of the later thirties) shows the Earth with several workers standing with Red Flags in their hands. The Earth image and the workers’ figures are photomontage. Also, the Earth is part map, part another photograph showing the heads of workers at a march. The standing figures represent various countries – holding flags with the slogan “Long Live the World October” written in different languages including hieroglyphs, meaning that the October Revolution would happen no only in Russia, but in all other counties of the world.

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From Russia with Love

Intourist. Transsiberian express
M. Litvak, 1930

Here is a great example of the advertising posters of the thirties. This one is aimed at foreign audience as it is promoting the Transsiberian Express journey.

The poster shows a curved surface of the Earth with symbols of Moscow and Beijing shown: to the left there are Kremlin towers and a dome of Saint Basil's Cathedral. Moscow is the starting point of the Transsiberian Railway. Its four routes nowadays lead to Vladivostok – the largest of the Eastern Russian Cities (6430 km from Moscow), to North Korea, Mongolia and China arriving at Beijing. On the poster this is signified by the Chinese pagoda and Shinto shrine gate – torii, meaning that this is also an easy way to get to Japan.

The poster is very dynamic – the train is moving fast through the red star gate, gate to the communist Russia. The header sais: “Transsiberian Express! The shortest way from Europe to the Far East”. The footer goes: “Intourist. Moscow. Hotel Metropol. The tickets in all major travelling agencies of the West”. Intourist was the official state travel agency of Soviet Union, founded in 1929, after the Soviet Union had been recognized by the majority of the Western States.

The cars have signs, which prove the high class of the long journey – the train has sleeping cars and dining cars as well. Below the train there are the names of the cities like Berlin, Moscow and finally Beijing. The Earth also has the price tag displayed. The first class 12 day journey costs 250 USD – which was quite a reasonable price bearing in mind the Great Depression of 1929.

But why German is the language of the poster? The thing was that according to the Treaty of Versailles Germany’s rights had been significantly derogated, especially in terms of weapons development and manufacturing. So Germany was looking for partners who could help it restore its military potential after the loss of WW1. In contravention to the Treaty Junkers (a German aircraft builder) was assembling its plains near Moscow and Krupp was building artillery works in the Central Asia. By 1929 Soviet Union had agreements with 27 German companies.

And in return the young Soviet Union, who was in bad need for modern technologies on its way to becoming an industrial power, received perfect training for its specialists. German professionals could have ample wages if travelled to Russia and shared their experience.

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The way machine sees us

The Eleventh
V. Stenberg, A. Stenberg, 1928

Laughing Man: You could put it like that, I suppose. "I am the machine that reveals the world to you as only I alone am able to see it"

Motoko: Dziga Vertov. He was a Russian film maker, wasn't he?

Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex - Japanese cyberpunk anime television show

This a movie poster, which announces the famous documentary by Dziga Vertov. His actual name was Denis Kaufman, and he was one of the founders and main theorists of news-reel and documentary shooting.

This documentary was released in 1928, and was called “The Eleventh”, meaning the eleventh year after the October Revolution. Its main idea was to show the progress the young soviet state had achieved. The man on the poster is a grotesque image of Dziga Vertov himself. His eyeglasses reflect the agricultural and industrial machinery. This is an illustration of one of his main theories – that a true documentary is not about mere snap-shooting of life, but instead it is about life, run through the eyes of the observer, whoever he is - or whatever it is. Unlike other documentaries of that time this principle implied the distinctive presence of the protagonist in the movie, although he might not be shown directly or it might not be human at all.

This was a silent black and white documentary. But the cut was done in a way that illustrated the sounds of the machinery and other things shown. This was a staggering technique for the twenties and it did earn Dziga Vertov a wide international acclaim.

This constructivist poster done by Stenberg brothers is a masterpiece itself. The bold type on the left side says the name of the film: “The Eleventh”. Every eyeglass has also this name inscribed in. To the right there are the credits: “Author-Director Dziga Vertov Chief Cameraman Kaufman”. The Chief Cameraman Kaufman was Dziga Vertov’s brother – Mikhail, who was also a noted film maker. There was also another brilliant cinematographer in this family: the third brother Boris, together with parents, moved to Poland after the Revolution. In 1954 he won Oscar and Golden Globe for the first American feature film On the Waterfront, but he never had a chance to meet his brothers after 1917.

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You say you wanna revolution

90^th Anniversary of the October Revolution
Bukheevy, 2007

Don't you know it's gonna be all right
all right, all right
Revolution by John Lennon, The Beatles

Today is the 90th Anniversary of the October Revolution. This was a milestone event in the history of Russia, and of course there were hundreds of posters created to commemorate and outline its features and consequences. Later I’ll be featuring them here.

But today I would like to show a poster which is definitely not a Soviet artwork. The style is different, and the release date also speaks for itself – this is a modern poster of the year 2007.

This poster is almost unartful, it has got very simple typographics, but, boy, has it got the idea!

The background is a modern Flag of Russia. It consists of three color fields – the white, the blue and the red. According to Wikipedia there are several meanings of these colors. The Flag may reflect the Russian social system under the monarchy: white represents God, blue the Tsar and red the peasants. Another very common interpretation is the association of colors with the main parts of the Russian Empire: white thus represents Belarus ("White Russia"), blue Ukraine (or Malorossia, "Little Russia"), and red "Great Russia". Note that Belarus and Ukraine are independent countries now (Before the Revolution they were part of the Russian Empire and later part of the Soviet Union). Back to the Flag. A different interpretation associates white with the bright future (where the color itself is associated with brightness, while its placement at the top - with future); blue with clouded present, and red with bloody past. These versions are not commonly known to everybody nowadays, and it is only the association between the red color and the Soviet Red Flag, which is recognized by majority of Russians.

So the authors add Hammer and Sickle to the red field turning it into a small Red Flag of the Soviet Union, symbolizing that although modern Russia does not resemble the old times, it still has the the 74 soviet years embedded into its history. The foundation of the economy, the superpower heritage (although acquired through numerous losses and hardships), the great Victory – and most importantly the lives of fathers and mothers, grandfathers and grandmothers – all this goes back to the Soviet times. Which were originated from the October Revolution of 1917.

From the craddle

“Soviet Posters in France” Art Exhibition
A. Yakushin, 1974

In Russian a poster is called “плакат”, or placard. The word itself originates from the verb “plaquer” – to stick, or to glue in French.

France played the main role in development of poster styles in the 19th century. Such outstanding artists as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec were creating posters which had much more art than advertising, ideology or communication in them.

In the Soviet Union this high-quality approach to posters was brought to the new level. The posters were on the forefront of official art. And of course the Government was using them to promote communism values and Soviet style abroad.

The poster above is announcing the Exhibition of Soviet Posters, which took place in Paris, France in November 1974-January 1975. The venue was the biggest art gallery and museum in the world – The Louvre.

The poster which promotes poster exhibition should have been of the highest graphical quality. And it was indeed. The graphics are laconic, symbolical and brilliant: the Red Star forms the flat background, blending together with a three dimensional image of Hammer and Sickle. Hammer and Sickle is aimed upward as if being held by The Worker and Kolhoz Woman sculpture, thus adding emotion and movement to the artwork. Note the hatching and the shades of the Hammer and Sickle – they are in perfect line with the geometrical simplicity of the red pentagram.

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The people's Army

Workers' and Peasants' Red Army
15 anniversary Art Exhibition
A. Deyneka, 1933

From wild forest to the British seas - Red Army is the mightiest!"
One of the famous revolutionary marches of the Civil War

This is an art exhibition poster devoted to the Soviet Red Army. The exhibits included paintings, graphics, sculpture, textile works related to the events the Red Army took part into – the Civil War, World War 1, Soviet-Polish War.

The Council of People's Commissars set up the Red Army by a Decree on January 28, 1918. In the 1918 the Red Army was quite democratic. The Army was based on the Red Guards which consisted of workers. At that time anybody could enlist, so the army contingent soon got very diverse. The discipline was weak and the orders were carried out according to its “Revolutionary significance”. The very idea of army hierarchy and strict obedience was considered to be bourgeois, and therefore contradicted with Communism.

All this did not help to fight the enemies of the Soviet Union, so in short time the original tsar’s army system was restored. Many of the pre-revolution military specialists were drafted to make the Russian Army a professional and effective force.

After coping with the most acute problems like intervention of Entente and offensives of the Whites, the ranks were combed-out thoroughly, leaving only the representatives of Workers’ and Peasants’ classes in the Red Army. Being a military man signified one’s political loyalty and devotion to communist ideals. The Soviet Union was a state of Workers and Peasants, so the Red Army was the people’s army.

The poster above was created by Alexander Deyneka – a brilliant and impressive artist. He was famous of his patriotic and battle-paintings. Here is one of his masterpieces named “Defense of Sevastopol”.

On this Red Army poster he pictured two soldier’s heads in helmets. The style is simple, and the face expressions are plain. They are determined and open, truly men of the people.

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