Adventures in the Soviet Imaginary: Soviet Children's Books and Graphic Art by Robert Bird

by Robert C. Bird

Two of the most striking manifestations of Soviet image culture were the children's book and the poster. Both of these forms testify to the alliance between experimental aesthetics and radical socialist ideology that held tenuously from the 1917 revolutions to the mid-1930s - and did so much to shape a distinctly Soviet civilization. The children's books and posters in Adventures in the Soviet Imaginary plot the development of this new image culture alongside the formation of new social and cultural identities.Described here and set in context by experts in the field, the University of Chicago Library's collections of Soviet graphic art allow one to trace the complex relationship between Soviet ideology and aesthetic culture over a crucial period, from the beginning of Stalin's Great Breakthrough in 1928 to the reconstruction and regrouping that followed World War II.

Genres: Art

Paperback

First published August 15, 2011

Reviews

[Mir · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book deals only with a specific art collection, so obviously some subgenres are excluded. Still, a decent intro to Soviet ideology as it was communicated to youth.

I thought the text could have used a bit more depth at some points (it's clearly not written FOR children, after all; the author uses words like "propaedeutic" and "constructivist"). The section on authors and artists who were condemned and imprisoned in particular seemed disingenuous: it does not address the possibility of people confessing to things they didn't believe (the conditions of questioning of prisoners is not described) nor does it analyze the criterion that simple absence of pro-Soviet material was treated as an anti-Soviet stance. [for those unfamiliar with this period, the equivalent would be saying a picture book about puppies was anti-American because there was no patriotic message.]

Fine, could have been stronger.