Kultintern was an international organisation set up to enable the Russian

Proletkult Proletkult ( rus, Пролетку́льт, p=prəlʲɪtˈkulʲt), a portmanteau of the Russian words "proletarskaya kultura" (proletarian culture), was an experimental Soviet artistic institution that arose in conjunction with the Russian Revolut ...

organisation to work with an international network of contacts alongside the

Comintern The Communist International (Comintern), also known as the Third International, was a Soviet Union, Soviet-controlled international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism. The Comintern resolved at its Second Congress to ...

. Its goal was to spread "proletarian culture". It was first proposed in an issue of ''Gorn'', publication of Proletkult, during the

First Congress of the Communist International The 1st Congress of the Communist International was an international gathering of communist, revolutionary socialist, and syndicalist delegates held in Moscow which established the Communist International (Comintern). The gathering, held from Marc ...

, March 1919, but practical steps were only taken during the Second Congress of the Communist International.

Provisional International Bureau

A group of members of the International Bureau of Proletkult, 1920

This was set up on 12 August 1920 following the Comintern Congress. The president was

Anatoly Lunacharsky Anatoly Vasilyevich Lunacharsky (russian: Анато́лий Васи́льевич Лунача́рский) (born Anatoly Aleksandrovich Antonov, – 26 December 1933) was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and the first Bolshevik Soviet People' ...

and the General Secretary

Pavel Lebedev-Polianskii Pavel Ivanovich Lebedev-Polianskii (Russian: Па́вел Ива́нович Ле́бедев-Поля́нский; 21 December 1881 – 4 April 1948) was a Bolshevik revolutionary and later a prominent Soviet state functionary, literary scho ...

. The Bureau included several international delegates: ;Executive Committee *

Wilhelm Herzog Wilhelm Herzog (12 January 1884 in Berlin – 4 April 1960 in Munich) was a German historian of literature and culture, dramatist, encyclopedist, and pacifist. Life He studied economics, Germanistics and history of art in Berlin. After publishi ...

(Germany) * Jules Humbert-Droz (Switzerland) *

Nicola Bombacci Nicola Bombacci (24 October 1879 – 28 April 1945) was an Italian Marxist revolutionary and later, a fascist politician. He began in the Italian Socialist Party as an opponent of the reformist wing and became a founding member of the Communist Pa ...

(Italy) *

William McLaine William McLaine (1891–1960) was an engineer, Marxist and trade union activist. McLaine worked as a mechanic and joined the Amalgamated Engineering Union (AEU) in 1912. He became secretary of the Manchester No.2 branch in 1916. Opposed to Wo ...

(Great Britain) *

Raymond Lefebvre Raymond-Louis Lefebvre (24 April 1891, Vire – presumed date of death 1 October 1920) was a French writer and political activist. He attended the 2nd World Congress of the Comintern from 19 July to 7 August 1920, but along with two other Fre ...

(France) ;Others *

Max Barthel Max Barthel (born 17 November 1893 in Loschwitz, Dresden — died 17 June 1975 in Waldbröl) was a German writer. A factory worker, Barthel was a member of the socialist youth movement; he was a World War I frontline soldier from 1914 to 191 ...

(Germany) * John Reed (USA) *

Tom Quelch Thomas Quelch (1886–1954) was a British journalist and the son of veteran Marxist Harry Quelch. a member of the British Socialist Party in the early part of the 20th century, becoming a communist activist in Great Britain in the 1920s. Quelch ...

(Great Britain) *

Karl Toman Karl Toman (2 January 1884 – 5 February 1950) was an Austrian politician and trade unionist. Toman hailed from a working-class family. He went on to become a metal industry worker.Starch, Roland. „Die KPÖ und die Komintern“' Toman joined t ...

(Austria) *

War Van Overstraeten Eduard (War) Van Overstraeten (8 May 1891, Wetteren – 9 December 1981, Bruges) was a Flemish communist activist and painter. He was one of the founders of the Communist Party of Belgium. At the end of the First World War, he was a member of ...

(Belgium) * Haavard Langseth (Norway) * Walther Bringolf (Switzerland)

Criticism

Leo Pasvolsky was one of the first people to criticise the formation of Kultintern. First he portrayed the movement as generally exhibiting a heavy monotony with poetry which was both facile and pretentious. However he further claimed that the foundation of Kultintern would reduce the Proletkult movement "not primarily, but exclusively" to a weapon to promote the

Bolshevik The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...

view of

communism Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society ...

References

{{reflist International cultural organizations Organizations established in 1920 Comintern

Provisional International Bureau

Criticism

See also

References