In November 1927 Stalin was planning his final moves to expel Leon Trotsky out of the Communist Party and eventually out of the Soviet Union. Since Lenin's death three years earlier Stalin wage a successful war of propaganda against his rival.
Art through out recorded history usually went beyond simple decorative beauty. It was the visual message of myths, religion and power. The monuments of kings and battles may have been artistically stunning but they left no doubt who won and who is in charge.
Up until the Industrial Revolution the artist was customarily the pet and play thing of a rich patron. And if the rich and powerful were paying the piper then the artist was obligated to play the tune. In Medieval Western Europe the Church had the deepest pockets and naturally commissioned most of the work.
During and after the Age of Discovery Europe developed a growing merchant class These people were not as rich as the landed gentry but they had similar tastes or maybe better said the nascent bourgeoisie where interested in finer things in life and they willing to spend their money to show off to friends and neighbors. Artists like Rembrandt were able to paint portraits on commission by day and create masterpieces by night. Other artists like Albrecht Durer were able to capitalize on printing press selling relatively inexpensive engravings and woodblock prints to the masses.
The big game changer was photography. Cameras became the unblinking eye of recorded reality. Except for the very rich the portrait photographer took over the place of the portrait painter. Artist in the western world were struck with an existential question of what to paint? Here is where the romantic movement came in, the artist would paint the feeling or the impression of the moment. the artist was to record the camera could not see.
The romantic artists where the first to fit the stereotype of the starving artist living on the edge of conventional society. Most of the artists in the movement believed in social equality, questioning authority and were against slavery, capital punishment and exploitation. They championed the bohemian lifestyle and turned their nose up at bourgeois values.
Now back to Stalin. Stalin understood the power of words and images to shape ideas, that's how he defeated Trotsky and Stalin was willing to art as a tool of social control. Like no other country in the world the Soviet Union was to embrace Social Realism as the official artist style.
Social Realism had it roots in France as a reaction to Romanticism, forty years before the October Revolution. The Social Realists of France saw the real truth not in ambiguous smears of color and form but in crystal clear renderings of the common people. They painted the lives of the working poor in images that may or may not have been factually true but were true on a deeper level.
Social Realism, during and after Stalin, became the "proletarian art" where all workers were seen as strong and noble and the soldiers of the revolutionary vanguard as brave and virtuous as they march forward their inevitable victory. Stalin saw the state as "the engineers of human souls". 
"Life as become better, life has become happier" -Stalin There is almost as much truth in that statement as there is irony. Until the 1860's most Russians lived as serfs Serfdom was virtually the same as slavery; and when the serfs were emancipated being a free peasant was no big improvement.
Under the Czars Russia was rapidly industrializing but it was a form of "crony capitalism". The Czars handed out monopolistic privileges to their friends and allies. The average worker even if they were an exceptional talent might be promoted to shop foreman but had little or no chance of rising above that. Under Communism many peasants saw their lives improve and the nation quickly develop.
Cheap mass printings of posters reinforced the message of a brighter future and also help distract the average Russian from the reign of terror during the purges. News of the purges had leaked out to the west but it wasn't until the fall of Communism that the extent of the purges were publicly known. Stalin presided over a government that killed more of its own people than the Nazi invasion of World War 2.
By 1934 Stalin had all independent art unions and collectives abolished. The NKVD, the Soviet state police became the arbiters what was acceptable art or decadent art. And the poor artists that were trying to expose truth and promote equality through art became a criminal of the state. Like George Orwell would point out in his book 1984 -nothing is expressly forbidden but everything is potentially a crime. The surviving Soviet artists knew how to self censor and stay safe.
As an art style, Social Realism still makes an appearance whenever there is an attempt to project an image of strength. These days Social Realism is ether thought of as propaganda or parody. Romney might not have seen the mixed message here but the influence is undeniable.
In one event where circumstances overshadow the art is when Diego Rivera was commissioned to paint a mural in the lobby of the RCA building in Rockefeller Center.
Today the RCA Building is known as 30 Rockefeller Center, the home of NBC and the building made famous by Tina Fey's comedy TV show 30 Rock. But don't expect to see Diego Rivera's mural there.
Rockefeller Center was the largest private investment building project in the 20th Century, 19 commercial buildings covering 22 acres of mid-town Manhattan. The cost was over 250 million dollars in 1930. It was the high holy temple of capitalism.
When it was discovered that Lenin's face was part of Diego Rivera's mural Man At The Crossroads, there was an uproar. Out of artistic integrity Rivera refused to change the mural. Rivera was then promptly paid and the mural covered over. The story makes a both an interesting parable and legendary tale.
Social Realism is so entwined with propaganda many times it's hard to know where one ends and the other begins. Like art of the ancient world, the statue on the left was erected in Prague in 1951 by the Soviets. It commemorated the Red Army liberating the city in 1945. To the Czechs it was a message that was loud and clear, who won the battle and at least for the moment who was in charge.
As one last note, sometimes the art becomes the story instead of the truth. Saint Francis of Assisi is the Catholic patron saint of animals. He was well know for his fervent faith and sincere kindness but there are no historical accounts of animals having any deep affinity for the man..
The legend of Saint Francis and his connect to "beasts of the field" comes from a group of painting started by Giotto di Bondone showing the saint preaching to the birds. Giotto was born about thirty years after the death of Saint Francis.
Have you ever heard the expression "that's for the birds" to say something is silly or ridiculous? That expression predates the days before Shakespeare. In Giotto's time it was considered vulgar -an actual waste of canvas and pigment to paint the image of peasants. The birds in the paintings were representatives of the poor people Saint Francis did preach to. The riff-raft and great unwashed of the 12th and 13th century could only be seen as birds or not at all. To paint real peasants, until the Social Realists in 19th century France, that really was "for the birds".
A couple of centuries after Saint Francis's death the birds in the paintings were taken as literal and the general public began to believe real birds flocked to hear the saint speak.
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