Description
The 1931 illustration "Before and Now" is a sharp satire on Soviet bureaucratic "campaigning." The two figures depicted represent seasonal agricultural campaigns: a woman dressed in long "clothing" covered with decrees and plans symbolizes the spring sowing of 1931, while the bent figure next to her is the previous autumn campaign, whose "paper covering" has already grown old. Loud slogans and plans are temporary shelters for bureaucrats to hide from real work until one campaign is replaced by another. This formal, paper-oriented approach ultimately ends in the failure and dismissal of managers. The drawing ridicules a reality where labor is replaced by paper promises.
