The Muzeon Park of Arts (formerly the Park of the Fallen Heroes or Fallen Monument Park) is a park outside the

Krymsky Val Krymsky Val () is a street in the Yakimanka District of Moscow, on the Garden Ring near Gorky Park. Moscow Metro stations nearby are Park Kultury and Oktyabrskaya. Also close are the Krymsky Bridge, Fallen Monument Park and Tretyakov Gallery ...

building in

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

shared by the modern-art division of the

Tretyakov Gallery The State Tretyakov Gallery (; abbreviated ГТГ, ''GTG'') is an art gallery in Moscow, Russia, which is considered the foremost depository of Russian fine art in the world. The gallery's history starts in 1856 when the Muscovite merchant Pavel ...

and the Central House of Artists. It is located between the Park Kultury and the Oktyabrskaya

underground Underground most commonly refers to: * Subterranea (geography), the regions beneath the surface of the Earth Underground may also refer to: Places * Buenos Aires Underground, a rapid transit system * London Underground, a rapid transit system * ...

stations. The largest open-air sculpture museum in

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

, it has over 1,000 artworks currently in its collection. The origins of the English-language exonym "Fallen Monument park" are unknown; Russian-language speakers either simply call the park the Sculpture Park of the Central House of Artists () or reference its legal title, Muzeon Park of Arts (Russian: , - literally: "Park of the Arts").

Background

The contestation and removal of monuments in the USSR goes back to its foundation. On April 12, 1918,

Vladimir Lenin Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov ( 187021 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, politician and political theorist. He was the first head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until Death and state funeral of ...

, revolutionary leader of the

Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

, released a decree "on the monuments of the Republic" in which he proclaimed that all monuments to the tsars and their affiliates should be removed from public view. He called for the establishment of a commission to decide on the fate of these monuments and to organize the creation of new monuments and emblems that would align with the Socialist revolution. In many cases the new Communist statues took the literal place of the statues removed under Lenin’s 1918 decree, being erected on the same site. One example of these monument transformations is the

Alexander Garden Obelisk The Alexander Garden Obelisk is an obelisk located within the Alexander Garden, near the walls of Kremlin, in Moscow, Russia. The obelisk was initially designed by S. A. Vlasev and erected on July 10, 1914, at the entrance of the garden. It was cr ...

in Moscow which originally memorialized the

Romanov dynasty The House of Romanov (also transliterated as Romanoff; , ) was the reigning imperial house of Russia from 1613 to 1917. They achieved prominence after Anastasia Romanovna married Ivan the Terrible, the first crowned tsar of all Russia. Ni ...

and was altered in 1918 to honor revolutionary left-wing thinkers such as

Karl Marx Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...

and

Friedrich Engels Friedrich Engels ( ;"Engels"
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''.equestrian statue to Peter the Great in

St. Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. The city had a population of 5,601, ...

commissioned by

Catherine the Great Catherine II. (born Princess Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst; 2 May 172917 November 1796), most commonly known as Catherine the Great, was the reigning empress of Russia from 1762 to 1796. She came to power after overthrowing her husband, Peter I ...

A period of statue mania thus ensued in the

USSR The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

. Statue mania refers to the mass-proliferation of statues, originated from Western culture in the nineteenth century. During his reign,

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili; 5 March 1953) was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin, his death in 1953. He held power as General Secret ...

increased Communist propaganda and statues across USSR territories exorbitantly. After Stalin’s death in 1953, Nikitia Khrushchev, his successor, enacted

de-Stalinization De-Stalinization () comprised a series of political reforms in the Soviet Union after Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin, the death of long-time leader Joseph Stalin in 1953, and Khrushchev Thaw, the thaw brought about by ascension of Nik ...

to end the

cult of personality A cult of personality, or a cult of the leader,Cas Mudde, Mudde, Cas and Kaltwasser, Cristóbal Rovira (2017) ''Populism: A Very Short Introduction''. New York: Oxford University Press. p. 63. is the result of an effort which is made to create ...

. The amount of intentional involvement that Lenin (and thus the 'original' revolution) had in the development of the cult of personality is a subject of ongoing debate. In 1965 the USSR joined the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) and the All-Russian Society for the Protection of Historical and Cultural Monuments (VOOPIK, ''Vserossiiskoe obshchestvo okhrany pamiatnikov istorii i kultury''). Art historian Maria Silina states that, "since then, an appreciable network of communist heritage sites has been created and still serves as a basis for inventories of heritage objects in Russia." On October 13, 1990

Mikhail Gorbachev Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (2 March 1931 – 30 August 2022) was a Soviet and Russian politician who served as the last leader of the Soviet Union from 1985 to dissolution of the Soviet Union, the country's dissolution in 1991. He served a ...

issued a decree "on the prevention of defacing monuments that are linked to the history of the state and its symbols." On August 22, 1991 the statue of

Felix Dzerzhinsky Felix Edmundovich Dzerzhinsky (; ; – 20 July 1926), nicknamed Iron Felix (), was a Soviet revolutionary and politician of Polish origin. From 1917 until his death in 1926, he led the first two Soviet secret police organizations, the Cheka a ...

outside the

KGB The Committee for State Security (, ), abbreviated as KGB (, ; ) was the main security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. It was the direct successor of preceding Soviet secret police agencies including the Cheka, Joint State Polit ...

headquarters in Moscow was officially authorized to be removed. The removal of this Dzerzhinsky statue, art historian Dario Gamboni argues, was the catalyst for the public to start targeting statues of USSR leaders across Russia.

History of the site

The Muzeon sits on the former site of the All-Russia Agricultural and Industrial Craft Exhibition, which was constructed in 1923. In the middle, young architect Andrei Burov built a soccer stadium. Vladimir Lenin visited the exhibition during his last trip to Moscow, three months before his death. Lenin was driven in a car past pavilions designed by

Konstantin Melnikov Konstantin Stepanovich Melnikov (Russian: Константин Степанович Мельников; – November 28, 1974) was a Russian architect and painter. His architectural work, compressed into a single decade (1923–33), placed ...

Vladimir Shchuko Vladimir Alekseyevich Shchuko ( rus, Влади́мир Алексе́евич Щуко́, p=ɕːʉˈko; October 17, 1878 – January 19, 1939) was a Russian architect, member of the Saint Petersburg school of Russian neoclassical revival notable ...

, and

Vera Mukhina Vera Ignatyevna Mukhina (; ; – 6 October 1953) was a Soviet sculptor and painter. She was nicknamed "the queen of Soviet sculpture". She was one of the members of the art association ‘ The Four Arts’, which existed in Moscow and Leningrad ...

, before departing for the estate of Gorki, where he died. The

Krymsky Bridge 300px, The Krymsky Bridge in 2017. The New Tretyakov Gallery of 20th-Century Art is visible behind the bridge on the right Krymsky Bridge () is a steel suspension bridge in Moscow. The bridge spans the Moskva River 1,800 metres south-west f ...

, the first

cable-stayed bridge A cable-stayed bridge has one or more ''towers'' (or ''pylons''), from which wire rope, cables support the bridge deck. A distinctive feature are the cables or wikt:stay#Etymology 3, stays, which run directly from the tower to the deck, norm ...

in the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

, was built under Joseph Stalin in 1938. The granite Krymskaya and Pushkinskaya embankments were laid down shortly thereafter. Until the late 19th century, there had not been any embankments, just river banks reinforced with paving stones. During the

Great Patriotic War The Eastern Front, also known as the Great Patriotic War (term), Great Patriotic War in the Soviet Union and its successor states, and the German–Soviet War in modern Germany and Ukraine, was a Theater (warfare), theatre of World War II ...

(also known as the Eastern Front of World War II)

military hardware Military technology is the application of technology for use in warfare. It comprises the kinds of technology that are distinctly military in nature and not civilian in application, usually because they lack useful or legal civilian application ...

and

anti-aircraft weapons Anti-aircraft warfare (AAW) is the counter to aerial warfare and includes "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action".AAP-6 It encompasses surface-based, subsurface ( submarine-launched), and air-ba ...

were stationed near Krymsky Bridge. By the late 1940s, a vast, empty space had appeared that became the city's largest snow-dumping ground. Architects proposed different suggestions for this site such as the Academy of Sciences to the Palace of the Soviets, however Culture Minister

Yekaterina Furtseva Yekaterina Alexeyevna Furtseva (; 7 December 1910 – 24 October 1974) was a Soviet politician and member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). She was the second woman to be elected member of the CPSU Presidium ( 20th term) and ...

insisted that Central House of Artists be built on the site. Construction on this project broke ground in 1965 amidst wooden shanties. The square around CHA was built in the 1980s. In the late 1980s, at the height of

Perestroika ''Perestroika'' ( ; rus, перестройка, r=perestrojka, p=pʲɪrʲɪˈstrojkə, a=ru-perestroika.ogg, links=no) was a political reform movement within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) during the late 1980s, widely associ ...

, CHA began holding lavish exhibitions by artists such as

Francis Bacon Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban (; 22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626) was an English philosopher and statesman who served as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England under King James I. Bacon argued for the importance of nat ...

Giorgio Morandi Giorgio Morandi (July 20, 1890 – June 18, 1964) was an Italian painter and printmaker widely known for his subtly muted still-life paintings of ceramic vessels, flowers, and landscapes—their quiet, meditative quality reflecting the artist's ...

Jannis Kounellis Jannis Kounellis (; 23 March 1936 – 16 February 2017) was a Greek Italian artist based in Rome. A key figure associated with Arte Povera, he studied at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome. Life and work Kounellis was born in Piraeus, Greece i ...

Robert Rauschenberg Milton Ernest "Robert" or "Bob" Rauschenberg (October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008) was an American painter and graphic artist whose early works anticipated the Pop art movement. Rauschenberg is well known for his Combine painting, Combines (1954� ...

, and

James Rosenquist James Albert Rosenquist (November 29, 1933 – March 31, 2017) was an American artist and one of the proponents of the pop art movement. Drawing from his background working in sign painting, Rosenquist's pieces often explored the role of advert ...

. Sculptures by Western

modernists Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and social issues were all aspects of this moveme ...

appeared in the adjacent park.

After dissolution of the USSR

On August 22, 1991, the statue of Felix Dzerzhinsky was dismantled and brought to the park. The Communist Party was banned in November of 1991. Busts of Lenin, and statues of Kalinin, Sverdlov, and Stalin from across Moscow started to pile up on the grass–including a pink-granite statue of Stalin, his face smashed by hammer blows. Sculptures were brought in from shuttered sculpture factories, Soviet-era workshops where anonymous artisans manufactured figurines. Moscow_Park_of_the_Arts

In January 1992, Moscow Mayor

Yury Luzhkov Yury Mikhailovich Luzhkov ( rus, Юрий Михайлович Лужков, p=ˈjʉrʲɪj mʲɪˈxajləvʲɪtɕ lʊˈʂkof; 1936 – 10 December 2019) was a Russian politician who served as mayor of Moscow from 1992 to 2010. Before the elect ...

signed a decree establishing the Muzeon Park of Arts. Gradually, some of the statues were hoisted to their feet and arranged throughout the park, while some still remain in their fallen form. It currently holds over 1,000 sculptures in its collection. It is split into themed sections (i.e. the Oriental Garden,

Pushkin Square Pushkinskaya Square or Pushkin Square () is a pedestrian open space in the Tverskoy District in central Moscow. Historically, it was known as Strastnaya Square () before being renamed for Alexander Pushkin in 1937. It is located at the juncti ...

, Portrait Row). Many of the monuments appeared before 1992. Post-communist tourism driven by Westerners has increased the number of visitors seeking the discarded Soviet monuments. In the 2000s, the park began hosting symposiums for sculptors working with limestone; the sculptures they donated are displayed on a special square reserved for white-stone sculptures. The symposiums featured a wide range of subjects and participants, including professionals such as Fakhraddin Rzayev, Vladimir Buinachev, and Grigory Krasnoshlykov, as well as amateurs.

Muzeon today

Major changes have taken place at Muzeon since 2011. As part of a government program to boost Moscow's tourism and leisure infrastructure, architect Yevgeny Asse developed a new master plan, including a redesigned landscape, for Muzeon that has transformed the park into a dynamic and contemporary space. Makeshift and rickety structures were removed, and a diagonal, winding “promenade” path linking Krymsky Val and Bolotny Island was laid down. Footpaths were resurfaced with granite pavers. The “School” pavilion (designed by architects Igor Chirkin and Alexey Podkidyshev), where Muzeon's education programs are held, was opened.

Gentrification Gentrification is the process whereby the character of a neighborhood changes through the influx of more Wealth, affluent residents (the "gentry") and investment. There is no agreed-upon definition of gentrification. In public discourse, it has ...

in Moscow has led to developers and real-estate agents seeking out sites which have protected status as Bolshevik landmarks for the benefit of increased market value. Young_man_practicing_tricks_against_monument_in_park

Young_man_practicing_tricks_against_monument_in_park

In 2013, following the adoption of a plan by architecture firm “Wowhaus” (Dmitry Likin and Oleg Shapiro) the Krymskaya Embankment was completely rebuilt and turned into a pedestrian area that stretches from the former “Red October” chocolate factory to the

Sparrow Hills Sparrow Hills (, ), formerly known as Lenin Hills (, ), is a hill on the right bank of the Moskva River and one of the highest points in Moscow, reaching a height of above the river level. The observation platform is on a steep bank above ...

. Unique

perennial In horticulture, the term perennial ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the year") is used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. It has thus been defined as a plant that lives more than 2 years. The term is also ...

flower beds were planted; unobtrusive obstacles for skateboarders and bike lanes were installed along with sleek benches and teardrop-shaped pavilions. A new “Vernisazh” (art exhibition space) with undulating rooftops and spacious, brightly lit stands was built. A splash fountain, Moscow's second, has become a popular attraction. Muzeon today is not only a place for preserving historical artifacts, but also an open-air contemporary art museum, a special exhibition space, a music festival venue, and a communal creative workshop. It is growing in popularity as a leisure destination amongst Moscovites and is now a part of Gorky Park. The pink-granite Stalin statue, which originally was displayed on its side, now stands upright and again on a pedestal following an swell in favor for the former USSR leader. An opinion poll from 2019 found that 70 percent of Russians thought that Stalin played a positive role in Russian history, according to the ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

''.

Responses to Soviet statues

Muzeon is part of a broader phenomenon from the 1990s, when former Soviet states began removing monuments of Soviet leaders from public squares, often discarding them in parks. Other examples of monument parks which preserve Socialist statues include the

Grūtas Park Grūtas Park (; also unofficially known as Stalin's World) is a socialist realism museum with a sculpture garden of Soviet-era statues and other Soviet ideological relics from the times of the Soviet occupation. Founded in 2001 by a local bus ...

in Druskininkai, Lithuania, the PRL Museum in Ruda Śląska, Poland,

Memento Park Memento Park (Hungarian: ''Szoborpark'') is an open-air museum in Budapest, Hungary, dedicated to monumental statues and sculpted plaques from People's Republic of Hungary, Hungary's Communist period (1949–1989). There are statues of Vladimir L ...

in Budapest, Hungary, the Gallery of the Art of Socialist Realism wing in the northern annex of the

Kozłówka Palace Kozłówka Palace (pronounced: , Polish: ''Pałac w Kozłówce'') is a large rococo and neoclassical palace complex of the Zamoyski family in Kozłówka, Lubartów County, Lublin Voivodeship in eastern Poland. The palace was built between 1735 ...

in Kozłówka, Poland, the Museum of Socialist Art in Sofia, Bulgaria. Some countries chose to destroy their Soviet statues after the collapse of the USSR. Notable examples include the removal of a monument to Stalin in his birthplace of

Gori, Georgia Gori ( ka, გორი ) is a city in eastern Georgia (country), Georgia, which serves as the mkhare, regional Capital (political), capital of Shida Kartli. It is located at the confluence of two rivers, the Mtkvari and the Liakhvi River, Liakh ...

in 2010, the destruction of the largest monument to Lenin in Ukraine at Zaporizhia, Ukraine in 2016, and the toppling of Latvia’s largest Soviet statue (standing 79 meters, or 259 feet 2 inches) in August of 2022. Erecting counter-monuments is another response to the presence of Soviet monuments. For example, sculptor Evgeny Chubarov’s “Victims of Soviet-Era Prison Camps” displays 282 stone heads in a cage. Chubarov donated this statue to Muzeon on the condition it be displayed next to the pink-granite Stalin statue. Another example is Yerbossyn Meldibekov’s “Transformer” in

Tashkent, Uzbekistan Tashkent (), also known as Toshkent, is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Uzbekistan, largest city of Uzbekistan. It is the most populous city in Central Asia, with a population of more than 3 million people as of April 1, 2024. I ...

, which presents an interchangeable statue intended to represent the shifting identities of post-Soviet states.

Famous sculptors

Vera Mukhina

was a 20th-century artist and highly-acclaimed female sculptor from the Soviet Union. Many know her as the artist behind “

Worker and Kolkhoz Woman ''Worker and Kolkhoz Woman'' () is a sculpture of two figures with a Hammer and sickle, sickle and a hammer raised over their heads. The concept and compositional design belong to the architect Boris Iofan. It is 24.5 metres (78 feet) h ...

,” one of the country's most enduring symbols. Mukhina herself was a complicated person: a semi-official sculptor and believer in the “new religion” (i.e. of the revolution), as well as a subtle artist who parted with illusions early on. Mukhina's connections to the theater found expression in the fine arts. '' We demand peace!'' (1950), inspired by the conflict between

North North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography. Etymology T ...

and

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the southern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders North Korea along the Korean Demilitarized Zone, with the Yellow Sea to the west and t ...

, looks like a

mise-en-scène (; or "what is put into the scene") is the stage design and arrangement of actors in scenes for a theatre or film production, both in the visual arts through storyboarding, visual themes, and cinematography and in narrative-storytelling through ...

: a masculine Russian soldier, dark-skinned youth with clenched fists, blind man, and a Korean mother holding a baby walk across the banners of a defeated army into a bright future behind a woman releasing a dove. Every contemporary

cliché A cliché ( or ; ) is a saying, idea, or element of an artistic work that has become overused to the point of losing its original meaning, novelty, or literal and figurative language, figurative or artistic power, even to the point of now being b ...

is here; Mukhina's intention was to make a propagandistic sculpture. Art historian Mikhail Alpatov has called the work cold and contrived, arguing that the artist, “couldn’t communicate the idea of fighting for peace in the language of art, which would have allowed her express herself through her work.” Today, however, the sculpture is valuable for a different reason; it is an example of exuberant, semi-official art and an important monument to the era that produced it. Mukhina's ingenuitive use

electroplating Electroplating, also known as electrochemical deposition or electrodeposition, is a process for producing a metal coating on a solid substrate through the redox, reduction of cations of that metal by means of a direct current, direct electric cur ...

reduced the statue's weight to enable transporting it between cities and countries.

Yevgeny Vuchetich

Yevgeny Vuchetich Yevgeny Viktorovich Vuchetich (Russian: Евгений Викторович Вучетич; –12 April 1974) was a Soviet sculptor and artist. He is known for his heroic monuments, often of allegoric style, including ''The Motherland Calls'', t ...

was one of the first well-known sculptors in the

to have received an exclusively Soviet education. Vuchetich was extremely prolific, sculpting dozens of official portraits of Soviet heroes. Vuchetich's sculptures are too numerous to be the work of one man, but it is unclear how many assistants he employed. The only recorded knowledge of his assistants is that in the early 1960s he invited sculptor Vadim Sidur to join him as an apprentice. Vuchetich's rise was swift. By the end of the

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, he had already received a commission to create a sculpture group honoring the late General Yefremov (completed in 1946), and was put in charge of designing the Soviet War Memorial in Berlin's

Treptower Park Treptower Park (, with a silent ''w'') is a park alongside the river Spree (river), Spree in Alt-Treptow, in the district of Treptow-Köpenick, south of central Berlin. History It was the location of the Great Industrial Exposition of Berlin i ...

. The story of the monument dedicated to General Yefremov is shrouded in mystery.

Notes and references

External links

Muzeon Park official websiteCentral House of Artists official website
* ttps://issuu.com/muzeonparkofarts/docs/muzeon_park_of_arts/1 Muzeon Park of Artsbr>History of social realism art
{{coord, 55, 43, 58, N, 37, 36, 19, E, region:RU-MOW_type:landmark, display=title Culture in Moscow Parks and gardens in Moscow Sculpture gardens, trails and parks in Russia Monument cemeteries Open-air museums in Russia Art gallery districts