Visualizing Labour: The Problem and a Case Study, U.S.S.R. in Construction1. Issue 2 (July 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Dell, Simon
• Is Part Of: Labour history review. Volume 84:Issue 2(2019)
• Page Start: 115
• Page End: 148
• Publication Date: 2019-07
• Subjects: Communism -- photomontage -- photo-essay; Labor -- History -- Periodicals; Working class -- History -- Periodicals; Arbeidsomstandigheden; Arbeidersbeweging; Labor; Working class; History; Periodicals; 305.562
• DOI: 10.3828/lhr.2019.7
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0961-5652

Abstract

Abstract : This essay examines the twofold problem of 'visualizing labour'. A first part of the problem is the status of 'labour' and its relationship with 'work'. A second issue is the status of 'visualization', which, as the process of conceiving images, is distinct from the process of representing given entities. These issues are rather entangled; here they are addressed in the context of Soviet Russia. I argue that from the inception of the first Five-Year Plan in April 1929, there was a need to visualize labour: this was integral to Josef Stalin's project of socialist construction. One result was the presentation of the worker as a very particular kind of hero. Such was the case for Viktor Kalmikov in U.S.S.R. in Construction.