UNKNOWN ARTIST, CIRCA 1930–1940 Sketch for the propaganda poster ‘Life without labor is theft, labor without art is barbarism’

bearing the monogram in Cyrillic and date ‘N.G. 34’ (lower right) gouache, tempera, pencil on paper 16 x 21,7 cm The inscription in Cyrillic ‘Zhizn’ bez truda — vorovstvo, trud bez iskusstva — varvarstvo’ is based on a well-known maxim attributed to the British art critic John Ruskin (1819–1900) - ’Life without industry is guilt, and industry without art is brutality’. This adapted version became widely circulated in Soviet cultural and intellectual circles, where the emphasis on the dignity of labour and its relationship to art acquired particular significance.