Wednesday, October 27, 2021

Soviet Boxart

 The poor Soviet boxart has a very deep reason for its existence, it is not simply because things became ugly under socialism, but because there was a theory of art behind it, in fact a Political Theory of Art, according to the Marxist principles, Punin said:

"The element of representation is already a characteristic element of a bourgeois understanding of art."

From there to say that Art is Bourgeois and therefore contrary to the People there was only one step, and they took it, Soviet Art cannot be beautiful, because beauty is what prerevolutionary art was looking for, while art for the People seek to spread a political message, and whoever does not do so does not deserve to be done, things like Color, Composition, Form, Current, are bourgeois concepts, (even Cubism and the Most Impressive were despicable Bourgeois Art).

An example, two colours Boxart,

It is true that there were attempts to get out of this rigid scheme, but unlike the West, artists who did not agree, were placated by the KGB, accused of being counterrevolutionaries, the Stalinist Terror kept at bay any type of discrepancy from the orthodox theory Marxist.

And so we have Boxart that we can hardly call Art, the old Frog models, manufactured in the USSR, only had a reduction to two colors or sometimes to one), of the Original Boxart of the British manufacturer, basically an example of Industrial Art, where the Boxart only indicated the content and was made using the least amount of materials possible.

After talking about so much Marxism, I go for a delicious Ham-Bourgeois, so that the Stalinist Marxist artists writhe in their graves.

Tuesday, June 29, 2021

Iconography of a Decade

 Each decade can be identified by its iconography, and this is usually a reflection of the soul of that generation, the seventies were in the world of modeling, a great era, boxart was going through its best time, before the Laws on it, to me. The best opinion was that of Revell, but in reality there were very good painters in various brands.


Art could very well enhance emotions, unlike current decorative art, there could be explosions, combats, all those things associated with great emotional energy, that gave that Boxart a strength that others do not have.

A few samples













Tuesday, April 27, 2021

Boxart not for everyone

 Matisse considered that:

"" The only audience that can claim avant-garde art is an educated bourgeoisie"

And this is absolutely true in Boxart, this type of art only has a small group of followers, even within the world of modelers, not everyone appreciates it, although in reality that is to be expected, because Modeling is a Modern Art, and the modelers, usually do, more than see, we are artists in every expression of the word, but our works are three-dimensional paintings, very attached to realistic art, perhaps the last representatives of such art.

And in the same way, we are specialists in techniques, colors, shapes, any of us could have a very good conversation with Da Vinci or Picasso, so the Boxart is only a small part of our artistic appreciation.

But in the seventies, art was superb, (now reduced to a simple decorative art, by law); But at that time we could hang a framed Steele's boxart painting and feel the deep emotions of the painting, in fact I remember having in my room the boxart of the USS Essex and some Lodela planes, along with a poster of Turner's Storm and a photo of a mural by Siqueiros; I liked art, because it makes you're live more complete, it makes your day to day more beautiful and profound.