the shackles of socialist realism

The civil strife and chaos that had torn Russia limb from limb in the early 20th Century, although brutally devastating, did not hail the end of the stability and power that had characterized the massive country for so much of history. The continuing strength of what was now the Soviet Union lay in the newly formed support structure provided by Socialist Realism, a force that directed the awareness of, and the arts produced by, the …

…for many, it had become a strict regime of censorship and repression. Those artists who wished to create their own individual, progressive works that didn't fit the Socialist Realist mold had to go into hiding or keep their art far from the public eye. They wouldn't be able to emerge until the 1960s, when Socialist Realism - and the shackles with which it constricted the art world - would crumble with the fall of Stalin.