May Day

From the minutes of a meeting of the Arts Board Moscow Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies, on the Organization of the 1918 May Day Celebrations in Moscow

14 April 1918

Source: Street Art of the Revolution: Festivals and Celebrations in Russia 1918-33, ed, Vladimir Tolstoy, Irina Bibikova, Catherine Cooke, Iskusstvo, 1984;
HTML: for marxists.org in April, 2002.

Those present: V. A. Vesnin, V. A. Vatagin, S. I. Dymshits-Tolstaya, A. I. Ivanov, A. V. Kuprin, P. V. Kuznetsov, P. P. Malinovsky, A. A. Morgunov, S. V. Noakovsky, V. Y. Tatlin, N. A. Udaltsova, A. V. Shchusev.

Topic discussed: the organization of the May Day celebrations.

Opening the discussion, the Chairman pointed to the two tasks facing those delegated by the board to participate on the Moscow Soviet's Commission for Festival Preparations.

1 The organization of an orderly and beautiful mass parade.

2 The decoration of the graves of fallen comrades on Red Square, the starting point of proletarian festivals.

After a stormy exchange of opinions it was decided:

1 to elect a board of three persons. V. A. Vesnin, Y. Korotkov and A. Rodchenko. General instructions were adopted after discussions;

2 that the task of the Arts Board is to draw up a general plan for the festival organization, giving details of the creative initiative to be taken by the workers' districts and indicating the relevant professional artistic organizations in such cases when the districts request help. Special attention should be paid to the adornment of the graves of fallen comrades at the foot of the Kremlin walls and to the decoration of Red Square. Members of the Board are requested to provide draft designs for the adornment of the graves and the square. The adornment of the graves is entrusted to the same board of three persons with the involvement of the trade unions of sculptors, painters and architects.

Chairman: P. P. Malinovsky Secretary: Oranovsky

TsGAORSS of the City of Moscow, f.528, op.5, d.115, 1.38-39.

[Note: Documents show that A. M. Rodchenko did not take part in the arrangement of the 1918 May Day celebrations and was replaced by the artist F. F. Fyodorovsky on the board with V. A. Vesnin and Y. Korotkov (see: GAMO, f.66, op.l, d.76, 1.162).

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