Conference: Coming to the Surface or Going Underground? Art Practices, Actors, and Lifestyles in the Soviet Union of the 1950s-1970s

The Research Centre for East European Studies (FSO), Klagenfurter Str. 8, 28359 Bremen | Raum 3790

November 13-14, 2025
Guest registration by November 7, 2025, via the form

Working language: English

Stalin’s death and the subsequent “thaw” under Khrushchev fundamentally shook the Soviet Union: previously believed truths, self-images, and ways of life were called into question, as were Soviet institutions and the party itself. The search for new forms of expression led to the emergence of a variety of alternative artistic milieus in numerous locations within the Soviet Union. To use Mark Lipovetsky’s metaphor, these multiple alternative local communities shaped an “underground archipelago” that produced different norms, values, hierarchies, rituals, lifestyles, and self-conceptualization patterns. Our conference will explore these alternative scenes, particularly examining the various sources of intellectual dissent and artistic divergence, the media used for self-expression, and the artists’ channels of communication. We are specifically interested in early unofficial artistic practices developed outside the well-established centers of Moscow and Leningrad.

Program of the conference 

Booklet of the conference

Forschungsstelle Osteuropa (FSO), Constructor University, funded by Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG)

Picture: Evgenii Mikhnov-Voitenko. Handshake. Nitro-Enamel on cardboard. 150 x 150 cm. Courtesy of the artist's family