REMEMBRANCE IN TIME - Index of

INSTITUTIONAL MECHANISMS AS A
REGULATOR IN THE FIELD OF
MONUMENTAL ARTS DURING THE
SOCIALISM PERIOD
Anelia ALEKSANDROVA 1
Abstract: Numerous State Institutions have established a National programme for new advance in
the development of Bulgarian Architecture and Art Synthesis until 1990. In that programme, some
particular measures for the realization of certain institutional requirements have been set up. A
uniform art policy has been implemented for the construction of architectural sites, for the
formation of architectural environment and accomplishment of art synthesis, as well as for the
establishment of the look of towns and villages. For the accomplishment of Art Synthesis, a
complete system has been established for planning, funding and conducting creative cooperation
between architects and artists in producing pieces of Art tightly related to the architectural
environment. That leads to a complete policy in ordering and producing Monumental Art works.
Through the means of Art Synthesis the ideological and educational task of Mural-monumental
Arts is completed and the artistic taste of man is shaped up. All those mechanisms for producing
Monumental Art works during the Socialism period are aimed at the accomplishment of pieces of
Art of high aesthetic and emphatic ideological impact in architectural environment.
During the Socialism period a crucial importance is rendered to the development,
humanizing and aesthetic modification of man’s “living environment”. The main role for
the accomplishment of that goal belongs to architecture and its relation with other arts,
including monumental forms. Architecture and Monumental Arts are considered to be “a
powerful means for the formation of a harmonious living environment, for development
of versatile personalities, for the spiritual and aesthetic evolution of people”. 1
Through the years following the April Plenum /1956/ of the CC of BCP 2 , changes have
taken place first in the development of Bulgarian Architecture, since a complex idea for
the building of space living environment has been created. That has conditioned the
creation in both interior and exterior spaces of a series of monumental works, providing
synthesis with Architecture. The intensive pace and enormous scale of construction, the
typification and industrialization are a prerequisite for a new type of creative solutions
within Architecture. In the time of industrialized construction, problems connected with
architectural compositions, their unity and variety, tradition and creative attitude,
architectural image and art synthesis have received new contents. For the construction of
“fully valuable, aesthetic and humanized living environment” a uniform policy has to be
introduced for building architectural sites, for shaping the architectural environment and
achieving art synthesis, as well as for building up towns and villages. That has led to a
complete policy in ordering and producing monumental works. A uniform programme for
aesthetic education of people and especially the youth has been established.
1 National Academy of Art, Sofia, Bulgaria.