art posters of war

Don't Babble!

Talk is cheap, silence is golden. English Proverb

Be wide awake! These days

The walls do even listen.

It doesn’t take too long

From chattering TO TREASON.

The poster was created by the Russian artist Nina Vatolina in 1941. The plot is similar to the number of western posters, calling for prudence and silence during the rigorous period of the World War II. The image of woman is taken from “Motherland calling” poster by Irakli Toidze.  It should be said that the poster was widespread in the Soviet Union not only in the period of the Great Patriotic War (1941-1945), but even after, in the witch-hunting atmosphere of the last Stalinist years.

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Spain Republic Fight Poster

One thing that I am sure of, and which I can answer truthfully, is that whatever the contingencies that may arise here, wherever I am there will be no Communism.

Francisco Franco

As we know, the World War II started the 1st September 1939. But the Nazi Wehrmaht (and especially Luftwaffe) had its training ground before the year 1939. Adolf Hitler had an opportunity to try his warplanes in Spanish skies, when a Spanish general Francisco Franco raised a coup d’état against duly elected socialist government of Spain (07.18.1936). On the contrary, Stalin sent arms, war specialists and propagandists to the republican government to help like-minded socialists. Many volunteers throughout the world came to Spain to stand for the republic. The Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) was the first conflict between the far-right regimes on the one side (Nazi Gegmany, Fascist Italy, Frankists), and the Antifascist communist-liberal coalition on the other (Communists, Socialists, Liberals). The western democratic states stood aside the conflict.

The poster by a Spanish artist Tomás depicts the crucial moment of the conflict – the siege of Madrid. The 7th November 1936 the Republicans managed to repulse the Frankists from the Spanish capital. Simultaneously, the 7th November 1936 is the 19th anniversary of the October Socialist revolution in Russia.

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Let’s Fight the False Shock-Workers!

One day work is hard, and another day it is easy; but if I had waited for inspiration I am afraid I should have done nothing. The miner does not sit at the top of the shaft waiting for the coal to come bubbling up to the surface. One must go deep down, and work out every vein carefully. Arthur Sullivan

The beginning of 1930-s is marked by enormous shift in the soviet economy – creation a national heavy industry. Traditionally the light industry and the agricultural sector dominated over heavy industry in Russia. In the end of 1920-s the ambitious soviet government decided to transform Russia into an industrial superpower, and – not least important – to mechanize the soviet “Red Army” corps, bringing them up-to-date. Soviet economists drafted an impossible “Five-Year Plan”, moreover, Stalin demanded to fulfill the first “Five-Year Plan” within four years. So, the realization of industry busting plan became next to almost impossible.

In order to increase labor efficiency the soviet authorities inspired the approach of the shock-workers, so-called “A Movement of the Socialist Competition”. The workers must have elaborated enormous quotas in extra-hours. It is needless to say, that labor was hard and exhausting. Soviet propaganda promoted the idea of “the Socialist Competition”, and the top shock-workers were placed on the top of newspapers. Undoubtedly, the most famous shock-worker in the USSR was the coal-miner Alexei Stakhanov, who elaborated an enormous coal amount without exceeding the usual working-hours.

This poster, created circa 1931 by an unknown artist, appeals to unmask the false shock-workers, i. e. the people who say they are the top performers, but in reality don’t elaborate their working norms.

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