The Results of the First Five-Year Plan

Illustration from The Results of the First Five-Year Plan. Varvara Stepanova. 1932 C.E.

Photomontage.

• After the First World War, artists in Germany and the Soviet Union began to experiment with photomontage, the process of making a composite image by juxtaposing or mounting two or more photographs in order to give the illusion of a single image.
• A photomontage can include photographs, text, words and even newspaper clippings. 
• Russia had for centuries been an absolute monarchy ruled by a tsar, but between 1905 and 1922 the country underwent tremendous change, the result of two wars (World War I, 1914-18 and Civil War, 1917-22) and a series of uprisings that culminated in the October Revolution of 1917. 
• The young communist state was celebrated by many artists and intellectuals who saw an opportunity to end the corruption and extreme poverty that defined Russia for so long.
• The Russian avant-garde had experimented with new forms of art for decades and in the years after the Revolution, photomontage became a favorite technique of artists. 
• Varvara Stepanova was a talented painter, designer and photographer. She defined herself as a constructivist and focused her art on serving the ideals of the Soviet Union and was a leading member of the Russian avant-garde. 
• This photomontage is an ode to the success of the First Five-Year Plan, an initiative started by Stalin in 1928.
• The Plan was a list of strategic goals designed to grow the Soviet economy and accelerate its industrialization. These goals included collective farming, creating a military and artillery industry and increasing steel production.
• In this work of art, Stepanova has also used the tools of the propagandist. This photomontage is an ideological image intended to help establish, through its visual evidence, the great success of the Plan.
• In Stepanova’s photomontage, everything is carefully constructed. The artist uses only three types of color and tone. She alternates black and white with sepia photographs and integrates geometric planes of red to structure the composition.
• The cropped and oversized photograph of Lenin shows him speaking; his eyes turned to the left as if looking to the future. Below, a large crowd of people indicate the mass popularity of Stalin's political program and their desire to celebrate it.
• Red, the color of the Soviet flag, was often used by Stepanova in her photomontages. 
• She also commonly mis-matched the scale of photographic elements to create a sense of dynamism in her images. 
• Despite the flat, paper format, different elements are visually activated and can even seem to ‘pop out.’ 
• Our eyes are attracted to these oppositions and by the contrast between the indistinct masses and the individual portrait of Lenin. 
• There is a sharp contrast between the black and white photographs and the red elements. 
• Images are combined and manipulated to express the message the artist wants to convey. 
• This image celebrating of the results of the First Five-Year Plan is the artist’s interpretation of events. 
• The Plan resulted in radical measures that forced farmers to give up their land and their livestock. 
• Many people were reduced to extreme poverty and famine became widespread. Terror, violence, and fear replaced the initial optimism about the Plan. 
• Stepanova admits no fault or imperfection in The Results of the First Five-Year Plan.
• By using vibrant color, and striking images in a dynamic composition, she pioneered photomontage and revolutionized the way we now understand photography. 
• Stepanova's photomontages are an important reminder of how an artist can blur the line between aesthetic passion and ideology.
• Artist one of main figures in the Russian avant-garde movement; influenced by Cubism and Futurism; growth of industry; stimulate patriotism