Festivities in Honour of the Second Comintern Congress on 19 July 1920. Demonstration on Uritsky Square (now Palace Square)
1921
The Comintern or the Communist International was the international organisation founded to advocate the world communist movement. The Second Congress of the Comintern started working in St. Petersburg on 19 July 1920. The delegated from 25 countries took part in the Congress. Isaac Brodsky engaged Boris Kustodiev, one of the greatest artists of the World of Art union, to produce a painting devoted to one of the important events of post-revolutionary time.
Using peculiar to him decorative manner and carefulness in depiction of people’s types the artist represented the atmosphere of the celebration of the representatives of different nations who had come to the Congress. Being disabled because of the illness the artist had to travel by car of the PetroSovet round the city exploring the signs of the new city life that were unusual for him, made sketches and immersed in the atmosphere of the celebration. All these observations resulted in a free composition in which red colour different in tones dominated. The different tones of red along with depiction of the crowd in general and individual figures expressed the idea of celebration. “You should have waited for such street”, - the artist recollected. He was sure that “the painting must be the document of our descendants”.
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