Karl Marks navsegda: k 200-letiiu so dnia rozhdeniia / Karl Marx Forever: for the Bicentenary of his Birth
St. Petersburg: Rus muz, 2018. Sewn cl. Works of art published in this catalogue of an exhibition at the Russian museum portray, in various tones from idolatry to mockery, the thinker who inspired revolutions in Russia, the only major European country where Marx’s theories shaped society and government for almost a century. In 1905 the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party commissioned admiring portraits of the thinker. Marx’s image was ubiquitous on posters, banners, and monumental sculpture of the 1920s and 30s. The artists who got the commissions were some of the most talented of the period—e.g., published here are posters by Solomon Telingater and Gustav Klutsis. As early as the 1960s an ironic tone crept in, though in official art (exhibited in state museums) the laudatory tone of socialist realism prevailed. In the post-Soviet period the subject of Marx has continued to attract artists who, trying to make sense of the 70-year social experiment on their country partly propelled by Marx's works, portray him comically or derisively. The contrast between the early depictions and the later ones give this catalogue its piquancy. 119 pages, 25 x 23 cm, approximately 100 color and black-and-white illustrations, Russian or ENGLISH. Item #3364
ISBN: 9785933326274
Price: $52.00