Dead.” The first edifice of the Nazinregime was a monument to fallenncomrades, opened with great fanfarenon November 9, 1933. This was followednby a steady stream of statues,nmonuments, ensembles, even specialn”Castles of the Dead.” The idea behindnall these memorials to dead Nazisnwas to arouse in people a feeling ofnveneration for the history of the ThirdnReich. “Berlin must be filled withnthese . . . memorials; they must be-nPortrait of the Fuhrer; Fritz Erler, artist.n42 I CHRONICLESncome a part of its character,” Hitlerninstructed Professor Wilhelm Kreis,nwho was responsible for the Nazi versionnof “Monumental Propaganda”nand who planned to sow with “thesenmemorials” not just Berlin, but allnEurope.nIn calling for “Monumental Propaganda,”nLenin most likely could notnforesee the 1933 declaration by AnatolinLunacharsky (the Soviet People’snCommissar for Enlightment) that itnwas time “to bring to life the second,nmore mature stage of ‘MonumentalnPropaganda.”‘ Lunacharsky wanted tonhonor not only dead revolutionaries,nbut also the leader very much alive.nIt has been noted that while in andemocratic society the private life of anleader, king, or president is open tonpublic scrutiny, and he exists in society’snconsciousness as a human being,nthe personality of a totalitarian dictatornis enveloped by an impenetrablenshroud of mystery. Big Brother isneverywhere, but no one actually seesnhim; all achievements and virtues arenattributed to him, but no one canndistinguish the real from the legendary;nhis visage looks out from everynwall and newspaper, but no one knowsnwhat he really looks like, since in all ofnthese depictions of him he looks thensame as he did 10 or 20 years before.nAs a matter of fact, immortality was,nalmost literally, implied for Stalin. Anthought of his eventual demise andnreplacement, if uttered aloud, wouldnbring arrest and an accusation ofnterrorism.nThe being of totalitarian dictatorsnflows on as if in another dimension,nbeyond the mortal concepts of life andndeath. The function of art then becomesnthat of translating the dictator’snexistence from one reality to another,nthe visualization of a political myth innan artistic image, i.e., the “materialization”nof metaphors.nIn totalitarian society the cult of thendictator in life and his cult in art arenbuilt simultaneously: what becomes anpolitical reality in the first sphere immediatelynfinds visual expression innthe second. In the history of Soviet art,nthis cult first becomes visible in 1929-n30 (the time of Stalin’s rapid rise to thenpinnacle of power). It started, however,nwith the cult of the dead Lenin;napparently, the momentum of Lenin’sn”cult of the dead” was still going on.nIn 1924, immediately after Lenin’sndeath, his body was placed into antemporary wooden mausoleum. “Itnwas done,” the official announcementnstated, “in order to give all people whoncouldn’t come to Moscow for the funeralnthe opportunity to say farewell tonthe beloved leader.” Later this mausoleumnwas replaced by a sturdier one,nalso made of wood. In 1930, the imposingnmarble mausoleum was erected,nwhich right away became the sacramentalncenter of all Soviet politicalnliturgy.nnnOne year later, a decision was madento build the Palace of Soviets —nanother memorial to Lenin. It wasnintended to last forever and was tonsurpass in height all buildings in thenworld. (The only minor concern aboutnthis project was that on overcast days,nparts of Lenin’s 100-meter-tall statuenat the top of the Palace would benhidden behind the clouds.) A giganticnarchitectural and research institutenworked around the clock on the project.nAn enormous pit was dug on thenspot of Moscow’s largest cathedral—nthe Cathedral of Christ the Savior—nwhich had been blown up. The pressnraved about the grandiosity of thencomplex which was to include 17,500nsquare meters of oil paintings, 12,000nsquare meters of frescoes, 4,000 squarenmeters of mosaics, 20,000 square metersnof bas-reliefs, 12 sculpture groupsn12 meters high, and 170 sculpturengroups six meters high.nDuring the work, however, thendominant ideological content of allnthis enormous art output began tonchange. A few years later Iskusstvondefined it this way: “The painted andnplastic compositions will express hownLenin and Stalin are leading the Sovietnpeople to freedom and happiness.”nThus, the “cult of the dead” began tonbe mixed with the cult of the living.nStatue of Lenin in East Berlin; N.nTowsky, sculpter; 1970n