The Obliteration of the Avant-Garde Aesthetic: Comparative Study of 1930s Picturebooks by Samuil Marshak

Аннотация

Basing its findings on word and image analysis, this article seeks to juxtapose images from early and later editions of classic picturebooks authored by Samuil Marshak and illustrated by Vladimir Lebedev or Mikhail Tsekhanovsky, namely "Вчера и сегодня" (Yesterday and Today), Багаж (Baggage), "Мистер Твистер" (Mister Twister), and "Почта" (The Mail), to expose changes necessitated by new artistic and political
circumstances as picture books for children increasingly became a territory of conflict. Contrasts revealed by comparative visual analysis offer insights into the restrictions and adaptations illustrators made as the avant-garde aesthetic came under fire and children’s literature began to face increasing censorship. These changes reveal the fingerprints of ideology and censorship in an intermediate stage when a kind of hybridization of the avant-garde was occurring, just before the complete obliteration of the avant-garde aesthetic.

Keywords: Soviet, picture books, illustration, avant-garde, censorship, Samuil Marshak, Vladimir Lebedev, Mikhail Tsekhanovsky