"[A] carefully researched, complex and fascinating account of how, for over a decade, state patronage both sustained and transformed avant-garde practice. In this, the book breaks new scholarly ground. For producing a work that will be indispensable to those working on the period, as well as fascinating to other scholars, Kachurin is to be congratulated." —The NEP Era: Soviet Russia, 1921-1928
"The material history Pamela Kachurin pursues benefits from a wealth of archival research and, rather than using the kind of shorthand that is often the rule in such accounts, demonstrates that (seeming) trifles such as space allocations, payroll rosters, research briefs, and organizational charts, but also interpersonal networks and connections across agencies and institutions, did more to shape Soviet art during the period in question than has
been assumed." —Sven Spieker in Slavic Review
