From Postmodern Art to Stalinism: Donetsk’s Culture Reimagined

Abstract

This article analyzes the cultural transformation in the self-proclaimed “people’s republics” in the Donbas, characterized by a violent rejection of global postmodernist art and the return to a Soviet, often Stalinist, cultural message and visual language. The author, an art critic and curator, born and previously active in the Donbas, begins by discussing the destruction of unconventional art, even when created by the miners themselves, and the projects associated with the IZOLYATSIA art platform. The second part of the article deals with public art in the early years of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR), in particular, political posters and art exhibits, which employ Soviet or Soviet-like themes and visual imagery. In a notable departure from the Russian model, the “mobilized art” in the separatist-controlled Donbas features positive references to the Bolshevik Revolution. Throughout the article, the concept of violence is used to analyze the mediatized destruction of nonrealist art and the construction of the DNR’s self-image.