Chapter 11. The Petrodvorets Canteen Combine

Although political propaganda did exist in Peterhof, yet it existed in a more secluded manner. When Kozlov went to see his friends in Leningrad, he took the train at the “Novyi Petergof” (New Peterhof) station, Nikolai Benois’ famous neo-gothic landmark dating to the mid-19^th century, whose arcades were inspired by Orvieto Cathedral, in Italy. Now the huge hall, where members of the Russian imperial family had once received their guests and celebrated balls, was almost empty, except for the ticket office and a six meter oil portrait of Lenin, located between the entrance doors to the ladies and gents toilets. The portrait, resembling a tremendous blow-up of a poster, might have compensated the fact that unlike other Soviet towns, Peterhof did not host an outdoor monument to Lenin.

Interior of Peterhof railway station ("New Peterhof") in 1986 From left to right: Misha Malin, girl, Valery Alakhov, Andrei Krisanov For many years, architect Nikolai Benois' famous landmark was decorated with a huge portrait of Lenin, placed between the entrances to the ladies and gents toilets. Kozlov applied a scratching technique to the moist emulsion of the negative. Photo: (E-E) Evgenij Kozlov, 1986

Peterhof Grand Palace, view from the Upper Garden on the west wing. In 1979, Kozlov had a job as a designer at the Palace-Museum of the city of Petrodvorets (Peterhof); his workplace was on the ground floor of the annexe left in the picture. Photo: Hannelore Fobo, 2020

Political propaganda wasn’t absent from Evgenij Kozlov’s everyday life in Peterhof either, last but not least through his jobs: he often worked as a graphic designer, and his tasks included the production of visual propaganda (“наглядная агитация”), which could be political propaganda (signs and banners) or simply sign-boards for particular places – doors, canteens etc. Among his workplaces were Peterhof Grand Palace, a supermarket, a hospital, and some other, mostly local places.

E-E Kozlov didn’t have much choice. Lacking an official art diploma, he was obliged to join the proletarian workforce, as Soviet law required the population of working age to do something useful. Being an “unofficial” artist put him into the category of amateur or non-professional artist, which meant that he couldn’t just dedicate himself to art (or sell his works) without risking being charged with social parasitism [1]. There are in fact considerable gaps in E-E’s labour book, since he tried to keep the time spent at his jobs to a minimum – and the periods between employments to a maximum. 

The cause for his lack of enthusiasm gets quite clear when we read his journal entry from 23 January 1983, where he writes about a job he had for two months, from 15 December 1982 to 14 February 1983, at the House of Culture at Nizino, a village next to Peterhof.

23/1/83 A month has passed since I started working at Nizino. I have my own workshop and a lot of work to do. My back gets tired from leaning over the table all the time. I‘m wasting my time and energy on lettering and on pasting clippings from posters to plywood. It’s the same routine every day, and in the end it all has to be thrown away or remade a year later, at most. It’s time spent for nothing, a style of art as propaganda.

Art has lost its pace, the number of paintings and graphic works has dropped so much that I’m constantly worrying about the future, feeling guilty about myself and in front of people.[2]

Kozlov remembers running to the bus stop early in the morning at minus 30 degree Celsius – in case he missed the bus to Nizino, he had to wait for another forty minutes. He was happy when he quit the job, although it is not impossible that Nizino inspired him to his first works carried out with the help of stencilling techniques, Sit Venia Verbo and Commissars. I described these works in Chapter 4.  

Kozlov’s next job as a guardian gave him more opportunities to carry out meaningful activities: he spent the long hours inside a security cabin translating a Marc Chagall art book (see Chapter 5).

Shortly afterwards, he received a job offer as a “construction’s group third class painter” (маляр 3-разряда в Стройгруппу) at the Petrodvorets Canteen Combine (Трест столовых г. Петродворца), which he signed in September 1983. It was to be the longest job he ever held in his career as an “unofficial” visual propaganda designer: he remained there a full three years.

Peterhof, Upper Garden. The view is towards the Church Paviliont at the eastern wing of the Grand Palace. The Upper Garden House on the right, where the Petrodvorets Canteen Combine had its office during the Soviet period, can be accessed from the Upper Garden or from Pravlensky Street. Photo: Hannelore Fobo, 2020

The Petrodvorets Canteen Combine coordinated the work of a large number of cafés, restaurants, snack stalls and canteens in the Petrodvorets (Peterhof) district, including those at the Palace gardens. It had its main office near the Grand Palace, in the Upper Garden House or Palais imperial, another one of court architect Nicholas Benois’ projects.

Upper Garden House with entrance door from Pravlensky Street. On the ground floor (mezzanine), in the room next to the door, was Kozlov's workshop at the Petrodvorets Canteen Combine. Below, in the semi basement provided with small windows, was the "Bar Petrovsky". After a short period as a "Collectors' Museum", the building now serves the adminstration of the Palace Museum Photo: Hannelore Fobo, 2020		Upper Garden House. View from Pravlensky Street. The "Bar Petrovsky" had a separate entrance from the small courtyard, directly leading to the semi basement. Photo: snegir, 09. 12. 2011 https://www.citywalls.ru/photo152506.html

Kozlov’s small workshop was on the ground floor, and below, situated in a semi basement, was the Bar Petrovsky – the only pub in town. It had a separate entrance from the courtyard where visitors would queue up patiently to be let in, one by one. The pub had two sections, a fashionable bar serving champagne and cognac, and a beer pub, where Kozlov’s friend Viktor was working as a waiter.

		The letters T o and K i o are a reference both to Tokio, Japan, and to Igor Kio, a popular Soviet illusionist.
Bar Petrovsky, Peterhof. Viktor Labutov, looking at a chessboard installed on top of a tray with beer glasses, is reflecting on the next move . Photo: (E-E) Evgenij Kozlov, 1983.		(E-E) Evgenij Kozlov: Two untitled drawings, wax crayon and lithographic crayon on paper, 8 x 20 cm, 1987 or earlier.. Kozlov used the napkins from the Bar Petrovsky, and the stack of napkins is depicted in the drawing with the bar counter.

Whenever Kozlov felt like playing a game of chess with Viktor, or just having a beer, he would leave his office through the main door, and, standing on the sidewalk, bend down to the pub’s window to announce his coming to Viktor, who kept the chessboard at the bar counter, on top of a tray with beer glasses, so that he could make the next move in between serving his customers. Occasionally, Kozlov would sit at cocktail bar instead, fixing his inspirations to small pieces of paper taken from stacks of napkins; Viktor Ivanovich, the cocktail bar’s boss, respectfully called him “Leonardo”.  Some of these drawings became the sketches for larger works.

A picture of Kozlov at the workshop from 1986 shows some examples of visual propaganda. The banners were made by one of Kozlov’s colleagues; fortunately, he wasn’t the only one assigned to this noble duty – unfortunately, examples of his own works have not been documented. Some of the slogans and text are:

Да здравствует советская демократия! / Long Live Soviet Democracy!

Внешнюю и внутреннюю политику КПСС одобряем и поддерживаем / We support and approve the foreign and internal policy of the CPSU[3]

Прием стеклотары вне очереди / Please return glassware without queuing.

Спиртные напитки отпускаются с 14 ч. / Alcoholic drinks will be served after 2.00 p.m.

(E-E) Evgenij Kozlov wrapped into a piece of red calico (“kumach”), the material for the banners on the wall. The material had to be fixed to stretchers so that it would make a neat, rectangular surface for the letters which were painted with white water emulsion paint. Most probably, when old slogans were changed for new ones, the material was simply ripped off the stretchers and destroyed, so that the stretchers could be re-used. At that time, nobody understood the value of these perfect examples of pop art. Photo: Viktor Labutov, 1986, “Petrodvorets Canteen Combine”, Petrodvorets (Peterhof), Leningrad. Archive (E-E) Evgenij Kozlov

How much time the artist effectively spent at his workplace is now difficult to say. Since the Petrodvorets Canteen Combine was in charge of a multitude of places, Kozlov could easily disappear for shorter or longer periods of time, pretending that he was called somewhere else. “Being busy somewhere else” became even easier when his boss gave him the keys to a second workshop, located on Peterhof’s main avenue – the Red Avenue, now again Saint Petersburg Avenue.

At some point, some difficulties arose because the Combine’s accounts department required Kozlov to deliver his timetable signed by the local directors. But over time, the artist learned how to fulfil such demands without much effort – much in the spirit of article 14 of the Soviet Constitution “By combining material and moral incentives and encouraging innovation and a creative attitude to work….”. In 1986, when his boss was no longer willing to tolerate his creative attitude to work, he quit his job.

Kozlov’s experience at the Petrodvorets Canteen Combine had an unexpected aftereffect on his art: in 1987, the red calico, available in large quantities at the Combine for the creation of propaganda banners, became the material for a series of five large works. In an article from 2020 discussing these works, I determined this series as White on Red, since the motifs are painted with white paint directly on the red textile.[4] Although in terms of their style, these works resemble early Soviet banners, my point is that they are not propaganda art, because the motifs displayed – a star, figures, a hammer and sickle, and the letter CCCP – are no longer signs, but have become images, that is, have been liberated of their earlier function of referring to something else. They have been awarded a life of their own.

(E-E) Evgenij Kozlov at his flat and studio Galaxy Gallery, Peterhof (Leningrad), 1987 Left: Звезда. 6 Фигур / Star. 6 Figures, white paint on red calico, 211 x 230 cm, 1987 Right: Звезда / Star, white paint on red calico, 207 x 225 cm, 1987 Photo: Andrey Fitenko, Archive (E-E) Evgenij Kozlov

previous page: Chapter 10. Fishing at Peter the Great’s pond
next page: Chapter 12. Galaxy Gallery

Introduction: The ostensibly synchronistic evolution of the New Artists

Part One: The New Artists and the Russian avant-garde

Chapter 1. Timur Novikov: native roots and western influences

Chapter 2. Perestroika, the Mayakovsky Friends Club, and pop art

Chapter 3. E-E Kozlov: Two Cosmic Systems

Chapter 4. ROSTA Windows stencil techniques – updated

Chapter 5. The inclusion or exclusion of stylistic influences

Chapter 6. From Mayakovsky to Larionov and folk art: something of everything

Chapter 7. Beyond the trend: Kozlov’s portrait of Timur Novikov (1988)

Chapter 8. Cosmopolitism and ethnicity: how Russian is the Russian avant-garde?

Chapter 9. Narodnost’: quite simply the people

Part Two: E-E Kozlov and Peterhof

Chapter 10. Fishing at Peter the Great’s pond

Chapter 11. The Petrodvorets Canteen Combine

Chapter 12. Galaxy Gallery

Chapter 13. A perception of pureness

– Works cited –

Uploaded 24 September 2020
Last updated 29 March 2022