| Address: | 10, Krymsky Val, Metro: Oktyabrskaya, Moscow, Russia |
| Contact: | +7 (499) 230 7788, http://www.tretyakovgallery.ru/ |
| Similar in Moscow: | Park of Sculptures Landmark, Tretyakov Gallery Gallery |
From Abstraction to Soviet propaganda paintings, you can see here world-famous masterpieces such as the 'White Square on White' by the suprematist Kasimir Malevich, or the warm 'Improvisations' by the expressionist abstract Vassily Kandinsky. As you visit the different halls of the gallery, you walk through colors, shapes and the 20th Century.
There are works by the cubofuturists Goncharova and Popova, and by the poetic Chagall, Petrov-Vodkin. It's interesting to see how Russian artists were at the avant-garde in the 1910's - being the instigators of revolutionary movements like Abstraction and Malevitch's Suprematism. Then it seems like Russian Art was totally in pace with western Art movements such as Rayonism and Cubism, before it found it's own way after the 1917 Revolution.
Tretyakov gallery has a nice collection of paintings made in the Soviet era. Before the '30s, the artists of the group Thirteen were making folk and impressionist paintings (Mavrina, Sofronova), the OST group (featuring Pimenov, Deneika, Williams) was interested in the changes in society. Their subjects were cities, factories, mechanisms; they were fascinated by everything developing and growing.
Then in the early 1930s until the '50s, Socialist Realism was imposed and all the independent groups were dissolved. Portraits of Stalin, of Russian scientists and cult personnalities were typical of this period.
For example, Deneika in 'At the construction of new factory shops' represented women at work, their bodies -very strong and full of life, seeming so happy to give their force to build machines, to make the country's economy rise. In 'the Defense of Petrograd', injured soldiers walk back from the battle field, and other young strong women and male soldiers walk towards it, determined to win.
Later when Krushchev began to rule and to make reforms in the country, artists had a lapse of free expression (Andronov, Popkov). In 1962, after the party leaders started to care about art there were two streams: official and unofficial art. The first imposed Realism and themes such as History, Labour (Nazarenko in the '70s gives these themes a new vigor, treating them in her own and very lyric way). And the latter went through different styles such as Pop art and metaphysical abstraction. It criticized the goverment through Surrealism, then it explored the essence of art (Shvartsman, Chuikov).
The Gallery also features works of the 80's, 90's.
