On the occasion of the Frankfurt Book Fair’s 2003 focal theme Russia, the exhibition “Dream Factory Communism” explores the universe of Soviet art under Stalin’s regime which is still only little known in the West. As part of a mass culture with a centralist organization, this art practice relied on advertising mechanisms and strategies for its highly effective propaganda images.

The more recent works of Soz Art articulate a visual comment on the period: they critically examine the totalitarian regime’s aesthetics and mark a distance which separates us from its works both aesthetically and politically. Presenting works by artists such as Kazimir Malevich, El Lissitzky, Gustav Kluzis, Dziga Vertov, Alexander Deineka, Alexander Gerasimov, Erik Bulatov, Komar & Melamid, and Ilya Kabakov, this major survey offers a cross-media network of references spanning from architectural drawing and sculpture to film, poster, and painting. Many of the works from collections like the Tretyakov Gallery, the Historical Museum of Moscow, the Russian State Library, and the Central Armed Forces Museum are accessible to the public for the first time since Stalin’s death in 1953.