The representation of the field camp in Soviet painting of 1960s - 1970s

The article addresses the pictorial representation of the so-called “field camp” in Soviet realist painting. A field camp is a temporary site equipped for providing meals and recreation to agrarian workers and situated as close to the place of their labor activity as it possible, i.e. directly in a field. Pictures representing the field camp portray Soviet people, workers, in the process of their creative labor for the sake of socialism, which allows us to treat this type of painting as an example of Socialist realism. Amongst the multiple subjects concerning the labor activity of Soviet people, the pictorial representation of the field camp as a space of work and recreation is of interest, because it reflects the specific to Soviet culture views on the role and value of agrarian labor. Our study has pursued two main purposes: - to demonstrate the symbolical value of the field camp pictorial representation and its influence on the development of Socialist realist painting in general; - to reveal a semiotic system (a system of visual images - the signifiers) which enables pictures representing the field camp to function efficiently in Soviet painting. In the course of the study we have also accomplished several additional tasks: - to outline the history of the subject under consideration in Soviet painting; - to interpret shifts in the representation of the subject in order to reveal their connection with the transformation of artistic strategies and ideological discourse. The study addresses some new issues. Soviet painting representing agrarian labor has never been considered in cultural studies. From such a perspective, Socialist realist painting is significant as a historical source for studying Soviet culture and ideology. The analysis of a range of images representing the field camp demonstrates that having emerged in the 1930-s the pictorial representation of agrarian labor became one of the most popular subjects in the 1960s -1970s. Such pictures make evident the essential difference between the socialist agrarian labor and the traditional farming. The field camp represents the meal of a working team, thereby manifesting the new form of social and labor relationships. The representation of the field camp acquired the following significant features: - the agrarian worker is portrayed in a new manner; - agrarian labor reflects the harmony of people and nature; - agrarian labor is depicted as the space of social harmony. We have also identified a variety of semiotic structures, which serve to express these specific features. These are the groups of signifiers representing gender relationships, opposition of “natural” and “technical”, dialectics of “individual” and “collective”, continuity of labor and domestic activities.

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