Table of contents:
- Upskirt house
- A girl with a paddle
- Worker and Kolkhoz Woman
- Apollo running a quadriga at the Bolshoi Theater
Video: Apollo's Quadriga, Girl with an Oar and other "indecent" sculptures of Moscow, which were not spared by the censorship
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
In Soviet times, almost all spheres of culture were censored. Sculptural compositions in Moscow were no exception. Even the most famous monuments confused officials with their appearance. The sculptors were forced to remake them in accordance with the ideas of officials about Soviet realism. Surprisingly, one of the symbols of Moscow has undergone a transformation already in the 21st century.
Upskirt house
House No. 17 on Tverskaya Street in Moscow was erected in 1940, crowning a sample of the Stalinist Empire style with a sculpture on the roof depicting a ballerina with a hammer and sickle in her hands. The author was Georgy Motovilov, who was considered a master of relief.
Many believed that the monument was dedicated to the example of the Bolshoi Theater, Olga Lepeshinskaya, who lived in the same house. Joseph Stalin himself tried not to miss performances with the participation of the ballerina.
However, Lepeshinskaya herself dispelled this myth: she never lived in this house, and no one sculpted a sculpture from her. Olga Vasilievna suggested the emergence of rumors that during the war she was often on duty on this roof together with Mikhail Gabovich, extinguishing incendiary mines dropped by the Germans.
In 1958, the monument was removed, allegedly due to its emergency condition. However, the fact that they did not even try to reconstruct it gave rise to another version of the disappearance of the sculpture. According to this version, the high authorities did not like to drive "under the skirt" every time, so the demolition order was issued.
In the winter of 2018, 60 years after the demolition, activists approached the city authorities with an initiative to restore the sculpture of a ballerina on the rotunda of the house. This idea has not yet received active support, but there are already artists who are ready to recreate a copy, because the original of the keeper of "Upskirt House" has long been lost.
A girl with a paddle
This particular monument, created by Ivan Shadr, had nothing to do with the well-known and widely replicated in Soviet times sculpture of an overweight woman with an oar that came out from under the chisel of Romuald Iodko. Iodko's monuments fully met the requirements of the Soviet era, depicting a woman toiler. These sculptures have been installed in many pioneer camps and city recreation parks throughout the country.
Ivan Shadr fulfilled the order of the Moscow Central Park of Culture and Leisure named after V. I. Gorky for the production of the sculpture "Girl with an Oar". His "Girl" was very different from the ideas of Soviet officials about what a Soviet woman should look like. The sculptor portrayed her too lively, beautiful and sexy, which was unacceptable.
A flurry of criticism fell upon Ivan Shadr. "Evening Moscow" published a devastating article in which the sculptor was accused of erotic imagery. The oar, according to the author, was a phallic symbol, because it is inserted into the oarlock. Critics considered the sculpture's chest erect, and the spray of the fountain in the center of which the sculpture was installed was compared to the eruption of a male seed.
The sculptor had to sculpt a new statue, and the original "Girl with an Oar" went at his expense to Voroshilovgrad (Luhansk), where it came under shelling during the war and was destroyed. However, the Moscow sculpture installed in its place was also destroyed in 1941 during the bombing of Moscow.
Fortunately. Ivan Shadr managed to make a plaster copy of his very first sculpture, and in 1950 it was transferred to bronze. In 2011, an exact copy of it was made and installed in Gorky Park.
Worker and Kolkhoz Woman
According to the idea of the sculptor Vera Mukhina, the worker and the collective farmer in the initial version were naked, they should only be slightly covered by the matter fluttering behind them. However, the selection committee did not appreciate the creative flight of the artist's thought. When viewing a miniature copy of the sculptor, they warned that she would receive an order for the production of a full-scale sculpture only if she dressed her characters. So overalls appeared on the worker, and a sundress on the collective farmer.
There were even critics who considered the collective farmer's hairstyle too disheveled. However, there were also defenders who stood up to defend the artist's right to self-expression.
Apollo running a quadriga at the Bolshoi Theater
During the reconstruction of the Bolshoi Theater, the sculpture that adorns its pediment has undergone some changes. Apollo, the controller of the quadriga, acquired a fig leaf and a laurel wreath appeared in his hand.
An interesting fact is that even in Soviet times, no one was embarrassed by the nudity of the leader of the muses and the patron of the arts. However, restorers insist that the fig leaf was originally in its place, but was lost. During the reconstruction, the artists only returned the historical authenticity to the sculpture by Peter Klodt.
Disputes on this matter do not subside to this day. Many art connoisseurs believe that it was possible to leave the sculptural image in its already familiar form.
Fortunately, the artists themselves did not suffer in the struggle for the chastity of the monuments. Boris IofanBoris Iofan, a young architect, the author of the project of one of the utopias of the twentieth century - the "Tower of Babel" of the Bolsheviks, was himself in disgrace.
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