Back in the USSR

The centre pieces of this are the large-format illustrated magazine “USSR in Construction” which appeared between 1930 and 1940 and documented the “triumphs” of the Five Year Plans. In addition a large number of photomontages and photographs, by the Latvian artist Gustav Klucis will be displayed for the first time along with works by El Lissitsky and Rodchenko.

The best designers and photographers of the day, including Max Alpert, Semeon Fridland, John Heartfield, Osip Khalip, El Lissitsky, Georgi Petrusov, Aleksandr Rodchenko, Arkadi Shaikhet, Varvara Stepanova and Nikolai Troshin worked on this and the pictures were reproduced using the most refined photogravure printing; the extendable fold-outs and innovative imagery of these magazines are still landmarks in publishing.

In addition, the Museum has recently acquired a large number of photomontages and photographs by the Latvian Gustav Klucis, also one of the most important and innovatory Soviet avant-garde artists and designers. These vintage prints and specially made new prints from the hand retouched glass negatives in the Museum´s collection cover the whole range of his work from the late 1920s and early 1930s. They will be displayed along with his classic photomontage political posters of 1930-31 and vintage photomontages prints of 1936 by El Lissitsky.

A display of posters from the time of the first Five Year Plan (1928-32) will also be shown which has been selected from the large collection of material originally donated to the National Museum by the Swedish professor Albert Engström in 1931. This, along with over 30 000 other twentieth century works on paper, has now been transferred to the collection of Moderna Museet. The posters, many of them by such leading artists as Viktor Deni, Aleksandr Deineka, Valentina Kulagina, Dmitri Moor and Nikolai Troshin, reflect the economic, cultural and ideological imperatives of their time in simple, abstracted designs which have now become twentieth century classics.

Curator: David Elliott