Expressionist palette in fine arts on the theme of World War II and the Great Patriotic War

This study demonstrates how the German Expressionist tradition, alongside Socialist Realism, was largely reflected in the work of Russian frontline artists: the pain of war often cannot be expressed in a clear, transparent, or carefully maintained realistic manner. The very phenomenon of pain does not presuppose the ordinary, mundane flow of life and its reproduction in the spirit of "imitation of nature." Pain—both physical and emotional—is always a breakdown, a person's escape from everyday respectability. The Expressionist worldview, once engendered by the threat and events of the First World War, corresponds to the worldview of the participants in the Second World War, becoming in many ways not so much a desire to "express" the self as an attempt to extrapolate the pain experienced externally: from the wounded soul—to canvas, paper, cardboard, and wood. The research material primarily consists of paintings and wooden sculptures on display in Russian cities commemorating the 85th anniversary of the Great Victory: "One Fate for All" at the Samara Regional Art Museum (A.M. Romanov, V.D. Sveshnikov, B.M. Nemansky), and the "Artists of Victory" exhibition at the Chuvash National Museum in Cheboksary (S.B. Otroshchenko, E.D. Simkin, N.A. Matsedonsky). Expressionist motifs in the fine arts of foreign artists and graphic artists are also touched upon: in addition to the wellknown paintings of S. Dalí and P. Picasso, B. Bobak, P.N. MacLeod, C.F. Comfort (Canada), and J. Fautrier (France).