How effective was the Soviet government's use of culture and arts?

What did the Soviet regime recognise?

embedding the values and beliefs of communism in the Soviet population would require more than propaganda and terror 

What would the government's aim of creating a 'new Soviet man' entail?

using artists and writers to construct a whole new culture that would sweep away the old bourgeois culture associated with the Tsarist regime

What was culture like before 1917?

distinguished cultural traditions but role in society limited to small section of educated elite

What range of pressures had the political environment of the Revolution produced?

from radical experimentation with new ideas to conservative tastes

In 1917 what was the Bolshevik Party divided over?

the importance and direction of cultural policy

What was Lenin's view on culture, and his tastes?

- believed it was vital but subordinate to class conflict and power retention
- conservative cultural tastes, liking for classical Russian culture

Who did Lenin want the Party to keep on side?

high calibre writers and artists

What development did Lenin implement early?

created a Commissariat of Enlightenment, a ministry of culture, to support and encourage artists, welcomed as it replaced heavy restrictions and censorship of old regime, encouraged artists to work with the new regime

Who did Lenin seem prepared to accommodate?

artists who were not communists but sympathetic to the ideals of the Revolution and who found plenty of material for their work in events of the period - Trotsky labelled them 'Fellow Travellers'

Who was Prolekult promoted by?

Alexander Bogdanov (leading figure in Party) and Anatoly Lunacharsky (head of Commissariat of Enlightenment)

What did Bogdanov argue?

- state needed to use new technology to create its own 'Proletarian Culture' or 'Prolekult'
- new group of proletarian artists should be assembled - art serving political and social purpose → key strand became known as Constructivists aiming to create a new socialist culture

What were workers and peasants encouraged to produce? (Prolekult)

their own culture (stories, theatre)

What was emphasised? (Prolekult)

collective of workers as a class (not individualism)

What contained poems about machines and factories? (Prolekult)

the magazine Smithy that was established

What did the government make use of to develop a new culture based on socialist values? (Prolekult)

festivals (even if extra food rations sometimes used as an incentive)

Describe the celebration of the Revolution's anniversary in 1920

- a re-enactment of the storming of the Winter Palace using over 8,000 people
- paraded through Red Square, Moscow, organised and directed by Party, example of street theatre, achievements of workers and therefore Party reinforced

What was Prolekult a direct challenge to but what happened?

high culture (and became popular for a time) - by the early 1920s government concerned at variety of viewpoints expressed = restrictions

What were challenged as a result of WWI sweeping away the old world?

traditional assumptions and practices related to the purpose, subjects and style of art

What was art like under avant-garde?

influence of Modernism with emphasis on abstract art coupled with Futurism = visions of new futuristic world

What was poster art like under avant-garde?

Bolsheviks acquired services of V Mayakovsky poet and playwright who produced slogans and posters for government, was innovative

What was painting and sculpture like under avant-garde?

K Malevich and V Kandinsky = examples of 'Fellow Travellers' - produced large output of experimental work in early 1920s

What was theatre like under avant-garde?

Vyacheslav Meyerhold produced pageant Mystery Bouffe (1918) - fantasy based on workers defeating exploiters but so confusing cancelled after one show

Why did the Bolsheviks put so much stress on visual arts?

literacy rates were low

What had an impact on popular reading?

the influence of the Futurists on science fiction

Why was cinema open to experimentation?

relatively new development

What films did Sergei Einstein make?

made Strike by 1924 and Battleship Potemkin was in production, to be released in 1925

Why was Einstein's work truly innovative?

his experimental use of imagery

What was the situation with cinema? (avant-garde)

Lenin had stated its importance as a tool for promoting political messages but it was sometimes too sophisticated for the audience

What was the Cultural Revolution?

the movement by Communist Party activists to purge all 'bourgeois' elements from Soviet culture

What did the Cultural Revolution entail?

 a full-scale assault on traditional writers and artists, Fellow Travellers tolerated under Lenin were removed and replaced with loyalists

How were the Komsomol involved with the Cultural Revolution?

- young enthusiastic communists encouraged to root out and attack 'bourgeois' elements
- theatre productions of suspect plays disrupted by booing and whistling

What happened in literature? (Cultural Revolution)

- the Russain Association of Proletarian Writers (RAPP) made increasingly bitter attacks on Fellow Travellers and condemned decadent individualism of writers who adopted new experimental techniques 
- preferred works that stressed achievements of workers in the cult of the 'little man'

What was a good example of a work preferred by RAPP?

Kataev's novel Time Forward (1932) → recounted story of a record-breaking shift at Magnitogorsk steel works (theme often described as 'Boy meets Girl meets Tractor - tied in with FYPs but soon lost popularity due to repetitive nature)

How did RAPP have some success?

did its best to encourage cultural activities in factories, such as drama groups and reading

What did the Party leadership announce in 1932?

RAPP would be closed down and replaced by a new Union of Soviet Writers (bringing the Cultural Revolution to an end)

What did Stalin call writers and artists?

"engineers of human souls"

What was the term 'Socialist Realism' used to describe?

- art that presented idealised images of life under socialism to inspire the population towards its achievement
- used to convince the population Stalin's statement "Life has become more joyous" was true

What policed Socialist Realism?

The Union of Soviet Writers - rewarding compliance, restricting resistance

Who conformed to the rules of Socialist Realism?

some writers such as Mikhail Zoshchenko (quality of work suffered)

Who took part in what the writer Isaac Babel called "the genre of silence"?

- those who refues to work under the restrictions of Socialist Realism and emigrated
- novelist Boris Pasternak (novels smuggled abroad and published) and poet Anna Akhamatova

Who committed suicide during the period of Socialist Realism?

Mayakovsky (others met death in labour camps)

What was art like under Socialist Realism?

- no experimentation, avant-garde styles rejected
- used to project ideal image of life under FYPs (often workers and peasants)
- Stalin told artists should make it clear who's responsible for achievements = fusion with cult of personality

What was literature like under Socialist Realism?

- change away from cult of 'little man' to heroes connected to Party
- standard plot in 1930s = hero from people guided by Party to greater things
- in 'high' literature e.g And Quiet flows the Don by Mikhail Sholokhov, and work by Maxim Gorky
- 'Lowbrow' literature = heroes from Russia's history, war/detective novels where evil capitalists thwarted
- through government agencies Party controlled, low price, tenfold growth in library acquisitions
- had things in common with traditional Russian folk literature

What was music like under Socialist Realism?

- 1935 Stalin walked out of performance of Shostakovich's opera Lady Macbeth of Mtensk due to discordant notes - real reason = shock at bedroom scene where trombones used
- in popular music, government favoured military songs > jazz, better to stick to well-known themes if wanted to continue
- banned saxophone in 1940s due to government concern over perceived decadent associations of jazz

What was architecture like under Socialist Realism?

- promoted style known as 'Stalin baroque' better known as 'wedding cake' = classical lines
- many public buildings
- examples: Moscow University rebuilt after 1945, Moscow metro system (elaborate murals and chandeliers)

What was film like under Socialist Realism?

- achievements of Revolution e.g Einstein's October (1927) - heroic version presenting as mass movement
→ more people died in making than in actual event (excessive use of extras)
- WWII - promoted patriotism in defence of Mother Russia and socialism (popular film = Alexander Nevsky)

What were the range of functions of Socialist Realism?

- images some Party members willing to believe and others used as inspiration to work harder
- others did not believe but found the images to be a satisfying method of escapism
- useful tool for government propaganda - formalised but accessible

Who have drawn attention to the range of purposes of Socialist Realism?

social historians such as R. Sites

What did new trends in popular music see?

the first appearance of jazz in Russia

What were the four main movements between 1917-53?

Prolekult, avant-garde, the Cultural Revolution and Socialist Realism

What signs were there immediately after WWII?

the government was prepared to allow artists and writers greater freedom

What liberal event happened in 1946?

Pasternak and Akhmatova allowed to give public readings of unorthodox poetry in Moscow to enthusiastic applause

How were signs of greater freedom in Stalin's last years quickly dispelled?

- as elements of Western culture 
- condemned in a campaign 'Zhdanovschina' (Zhdanov - Leningrad boss, interest in culture)

What campaign was launched in 1946 and what was it heavily influenced by?

- one to remove all aspects of 'bourgeois culture' from the West
- xenophobic attitudes → enhanced by development of Cold War

What happened to the classical composer Dmitri Shostakovich?

humiliation of being called into Zhdanov's office to have suitable tunes tapped out to him on a piano by Zhdanov (told him little point in composing music you could not hum) - restricted himself to writing film scores

Give examples of work Khrushchev allowed to be published that had been previously banned.

- work by Isaac Babel (shot during purges)
- more experimental poetry by young poets e.g Yevutshenko and Voznesenski
- re-appearance of jazz music
- publication of previously banned book by Solzhenitsyn 'One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich' - recounted life in Gulag (further novels by him followed - politically sound)

Where could writers still come up against restrictions? (Khrushchev)

when works did not fall easily into the political context

How was there speaking out against official culture? (Khrushchev)

- Sholokov described official Soviet culture as 'grey trash'
- 'low-brow' literature used to criticise Soviet system
- science-fiction novels often contained messages that acted as critiques to society

What was 'literature of conscience'?

- writing that did not focus on the idealised life unlike Socialist Realism
- new themes - spiritual concerns, bleakness of rural life, issues of adultery, divorce and alcohol abuse

By the late 1950s what did non-conformity do?

started to have an important impact on youth culture in the USSR

Why did urban groups develop and what did they do?

- Soviet youth tired with repetitive and unexciting themes of official cultural output - influenced by West
- listened to pop and rock'n'roll music emerging in West (smuggled)
- wore Western fashions of tight suits and short skirts
- labelled stilyago by authorities - described them as rude and ignorant freaks

When was Western music broadcast into the USSR?

by 1955 (by Voice of America radio)

Describe 'guitar-poet', one notable development in popular music.

- leading figure = Alexander Galich (composed and performed own work rather than government)
- often addressed feelings of individual - spoke to socially alienated
- audiences at underground venues small - tape recorder = spread to wider audience
- Magnitizdat (tape recorder self-publishing) = constant headache to authorities

What was the cultural climate like during Brezhnev years and what did official culture continue to focus on?

- narrow boundaries of what was acceptable after cultural thaw of Khrushchev, more certainty over what was permissable (push boundaries)
- propaganda and achievements of socialism and soviets focused on = stirring themes that majority  preferred even if creatives found it undemanding

Richars Stites about the Brezhnev period:
" T G O I, O A F E "

"the graveyard of ideas, openness and free expression"

What were aspects of non-conformity during the Brezhnev years?

-1970s conservative → trouble for sexual themes
- derevenshchiki school of village prose highlighted values of simple rural life → romanticised and unease due to possible critique of urban life
- nationalism received some encouragement but 'Russites' alienated non-Russians
- Soviet youth drawn towards cultural trends in West → Vladimir Vysotsky = influential guitar-poet, songs of sex and delinquency popular and funeral 1980 saw grief (worried gov) → growing alienation of youth from society, elderly Politburo struggled to understand control exercised over record production and radio airtime, undermined by cassette recorders (widely available early 1980s)

By the early 1980s what continued to cause the government irritation?

non-conformity in the cultural sphere

What did writers and artists continue to do in the Brezhnev years?

range of responses to avoid conforming → emigration, exile, refusal

How did the Brezhnev years make it easy to undermine the system?

using sub-texts → readers and audience became skilful at grasping the messages behind the work

Explain Khrushchev's clash with Boris Pasternak

- over noval Doctor Zhivago - set during Civil War, criticisms of Revolution
- publishers undecided, Khrushchev intervened without reading full text and banned
- smuggled abroad and edition first appeared Italy 1957
- positive reception → Pasternak awarded 1958 Nobel Prize for Literature - Khrushchev did not allow him to travel to Sweden to receive his prize 
= international embarrassment

What was a pet hate of Khrushchev's and evidence?

- abstract art - 1962 visited exhibition hall in Kremlin and viewed collection of art by young artists - proclaimed "a donkey could smear better art with his tail"
- artists harangued in full view of cameras and left in fear of arrest but no action taken

What did Joseph Bodsky do?

dropped out of school at 15 and wrote poetry
→ not licensed as a poet under the Writers' Union (and so arrested)

How was Bodsky encouraged by Anna Akhmatova?

poems read aloud at secret gatherings

What was Bodsky accused of and what was his case used to do?

- 'parasitism' and condemned for 'depravity' of his poetry 
- his trial and case = firm message to artists wishing to work independently

How was Bodsky dealt with and why was he eventually expelled from the Soviet Union?

- 1964 sentenced 5 years hard labour in prison on grounds that he had produced nothing of material value to Soviet state → legal apparatus used
- copy of detailed court records smuggled abroad, fellow writers campaigned
- release granted after two years then expelled

What did Bodsky's treatment indicate?

despite cultural thaw of Khrushchev years, limits to what Brezhnev's government tolerated

Why did Andrei Sinyavsky and Yuli Daniel soon come to the attention of the KGB?

had written short novels that depicted life in the Soviet Union as harsh and surreal (written under pseudonyms)

What happened to Sinyavsky and Daniel?

- arrested and acused of anti-Soviet propaganda under Article 70 of the criminal code
- February 10th 1966 sentenced → Sinyavsky 7 years in strict-regime labour camp, Daniel 5 years → harsh sentences

What did the arrest of Sinyavsky and Daniel lead to?

- demonstration of 200 students from Sinyavsky's institue
- open letter of support for the accused signed by 63 leading intellectuals
- over 200 letters sent to 23rd Party COngress asking for case to be reviewed

What was the significance of the case of Sinyavsky and Daniel?

allegations were based on the actual content of their literary work

How did the government attempt to direct and control cultural output?

- extensive system of state subsidies and ensuring access to radio and venues
- awards and priveleges to creatives serving state's interests
- employment withdrawn from troublemakers
- strayed far from what was acceptable = talk from government official to point out errors and warn of consequences

What happened to those artists and writers who continued to push boundaries?

- more punitive measures - Solzhenitsyn expelled from Writers' Union 1969 and Soviet Union 1974
→ continued to write in exile about harshness of Soviet life, his book 'The Gulag Archipelago' condemned for being filthy, anti-Soviet propaganda

Explain abstract and experimental art continuing to be a source of conflict with the government.

- 1970 local art gallery director Novosibirsk sentenced 8 years for displaying dissident art
- 1975 group of unofficial (not licensed by government) artists put on open-air exhibition
→ Brezhnev's government launched propaganda campaign and 'enraged public' (officially recruited hooligans) attacked the work, authorities brought in bulldozers
→ incident filmed and reported by foreign press = back on display, patched up

Explain dealing with subversive elements in popular culture.

- more difficult due to underground nature
- left to Andropov's government → restricted output of songs not composed by official Soviet composers to 20% of radio airtime
- commission set up to vet all rock groups before given permission to perform
- Komsomol groups employed to patrol streets and report on unacceptable activity

What were clashed between non-conformist artists and the government the cause of?

much bad publicity for the Soviet Union in the West, less significance within USSR

What did most artists and writers prefer?

to keep heads down, conform and avoid trouble

What was the stance of the general public?

more often than not happy with traditional output, undemanding art and entertainment preferred to intellectually stimulating work
→ non-conformist artists viewed as self-indulgent and out of touch with harsh realities of daily life

In 1961 what did the government go as far as to do?

to hold a conference that decided on which dance moves were permissible