In the years of the first five-year plans, one of the main heroes in fine art was the factory, and it was depicted as a Temple to Free Labour. Artists were interested in the diverse sectors of industry, the gigantic structures, the amazing mechanisms and the spectacular display. In similar paintings, amid the factory giants, the smoke and the racket, the flames and glint of metal, the workers are rendered as animate parts of a great mechanical organism. In Rozhdestvensky''s painting Rolling Shop of the Sickle and Hammer Plant, it seems at first sight that there are no people there; they cannot be seen. In the centre of the composition, which depicts an enormous factory floor, a blaze of fire bursts from the boilers sending out thousands of sparks. The almost demonic scene of taming the element of fire is filled with sounds, momentum, heat and contrasts in light.

Rozhdestvensky Vasily

ROZHDESTVENSKY Vasily Vasilievich
1884, Tula - 1963, Moscow
Painter, graphic artist. Studied under Abram Arkhipov, Konstantin Korovin and Valentin Serov at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture (1900–1911, with interval). Member of the Knave of Diamonds (1910, founding member), World of Art (1917) and the Association of Artists of Revolutionary Russia (1926). Contributed to ex¬hibitions (from 1907). Contributed to the exhibitions of the Moscow Fellowship of Artists (1907), Stephanos (1907), World of Art (1911, 1912, 1917, 1922), Knave of Diamonds (1913, 1914),1915 (1915), Moscow Painters (1925), Association of Artists of Revolutionary Russia (1926, 1928), Society of Moscow Artists (1927–29), International Exhibition in Venice (1924), Exhibition of Russian Art in Berlin (1922). Taught at the Free Art Studios in Moscow (1918–1920). Headed a branch of the State Free Art Studios in Udoml, Tver Province (1920–1922).