Artist collectives

The “collectives of artists” and the role of the “Plastic Fund” in the establishment of Socialist Realism in the 1950s Romania

A project supported by a research grant offered by European ArtEast Foundation.

This research proposal investigates how Socialist Realism commenced to be enforced in the fine arts beginning with 1948 in Romania and interrogates how was the collective identity of Socialist Realism achieved. The study of the archives of the fine arts organizations (the Syndicate of Fine Arts, SAF and the Union of Romanian Artists’, UAP) makes us discover how the model followed by these unions of artists was that of a collective endeavor with the help of “guidance commissions” organized with the assistance of Soviet counselors. This collective effort was accompanied by the establishment of “artists’ collectives”  and the “collective artists’ studios of creation”. At the same time was founded, in 1949 the “Plastic Fund” (Fondul Plastic, FP), which provided financial support to the new tasks assigned to visual artists, and then included the production of artistic materials, as well as of artists’ projects, also with the help of an artistic factory, the Combinatul Fondului Plastic (1952).