Year: 1988
 
Postcard made in the Soviet Union, 1988, with the monument of Alexander Puskin on Arts Square in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg). There are several statues of Russia’s greatest poet, Alexander Pushkin, in St. Petersburg but the finest of them is probably that which stands in front of the State Russian Museum on Ploshchad Iskusstv (Arts Square).
The monument was created by sculptor Mikhail Anikushin and erected in 1957 to mark the 250th anniversary of the founding of St. Petersburg (the city was, of course, founded in 1703 but the death of Joseph Stalin in 1953 delayed celebrations by a full four years).
Awarded the Lenin Prize in 1958 for his work, Anikushin said of his subject: “Pushkin was a man of very vivid character, straightforward in his actions and clear in his thoughts, therefore I tried to get rid of all superfluous details… I wanted the monument, the figure of Pushkin to radiate joy and sunshine”. Anikushin went on to design another statue of the poet, which stands at the end of the platform at Chernaya Rechka Metro Station.
Alexander Pushkin was a poet who is considered by many to be the greatest Russian poet and the founder of modern Russian Literature. He lived from 1799 until is death in 1837. He died in a duel. Along with other famous Russian writers he belonged to the golden age of Russian literature in the 19th. century.