Girl's profile 

Valentin Khrushch made this drawing of a girl's profile with pastel on paper. Given Khrushch’s biography, we can ask what it might have meant to make art like this in the Soviet Union. This image creates meaning through its subtle use of color. Khrushch lived and worked in Odessa, Ukraine, then part of the USSR. The social conditions shaping artistic production there were complex, particularly given the official doctrine of socialist realism, which demanded art serve the state’s ideological goals. What is interesting here, is that the work seems apolitical. With no definitive date, it is difficult to know, but it could be that its ambiguity was a form of quiet resistance. To research this further, one might consult archives of artists' organizations from that time, alongside studies of Soviet cultural policy. Art like this reminds us that its meaning is always tied to social and institutional context.