Last month, the CamCREES Revolution lecture series audience enjoyed a beautifully illustrated talk on Soviet porcelain.  Petr Aven spoke about the development of porcelain work in the Soviet Union, with examples from his own superlative collection.  This blog post looks at the collection’s staggering 3-volume catalogue, generously presented by Mr Aven to the University Library after his talk.  The subject of porcelain as a medium for Soviet propaganda is fascinating, and the catalogue is an exquisite and important addition to the Library on the topic.

Sovetskii farfor : mezhdu Oktiabr’skoi revoliutsiei i Otechestvennoi voinoi (Soviet porcelain : from the October Revolution to the Second World War) contains high-resolution pictures of every one of the many hundreds of items in the collection at the point of publication (2014) accompanied by academic articles and detailed information about each piece.  The three large volumes, each 33 centimetres tall, contain a combined total of over 1500 pages.  The first two volumes chiefly contain pictures, with volume 1 concentrating on figurines and volume 2 on tableware and other decorative pieces.  In each of these volumes, an important distinction is made between items produced on the basis of pre-October Revolution models (many of the dinner sets, for example, had already been cast and even partially painted before 1917 and were completed with Soviet designs and messages later) and post-1917 designs.

The third volume contains pictures of items received since the main body of work on volumes 1-2 had been completed, but also, crucially, contains carefully researched details about every item covered by the whole catalogue.  Each entry includes a description of the physical item, including marks of authorship and production, with the item’s name and the names of those involved in its manufacture given where known.  Bibliographical references to aid further research are often also given.

This lovely donation can be called up and consulted in the West Room.  Its classmark is S950.a.201.5826-5828.

In recent years, the UL has bought a good number of books on the subject of Russian and Soviet porcelain, with a few recently received titles still to be added to the catalogue and some earlier works written by the Sovetskii farfor set’s editor, El’vira Sametskaia, shortly to be acquired.  The subject term Porcelain can be used to initiate browse searches in iDiscover, with Porcelain, Russian and Porcelain, Soviet among the more specific terms to use.

All illustrations used in this post are taken from the catalogue, © Petr Aven.

Mel Bach