Dobrov, Alexander Nikolaevich
Born August 7, 1924, Svobodnoe, Kherson region, Ukrainian SSR; died 1989, Moscow, USSR
Alexander Nikolaevich Dobrov was a Soviet graphic artist who worked in the realm of poster design. From 1949 to 1954, Dobrov studied at the Academy of Arts of the Latvian SSR. By the mid-1950s, he was actively designing posters for the publishing houses of Sovietskii Khudozhnik (Soviet Artist), Izobrazitel’noe Iskusstvo (Fine Art Publishers), IzoGiz (State Publishing House of Fine Art), Plakat (All-Union Poster), and others. The artist also worked in the Visual Agitation Workshop of the Union of Artists of the RSFSR. Throughout his career, Alexander Dobrov left a significant mark on the history of Soviet visual propaganda as the breadth of topics the artist designed spanned from agriculture to sports, to industrial themes and posters for the military. Additionally, Dobrov is known for his educational posters on health protection carried out for the N. A. Semashko National Institute of Public Health in Moscow. Alexander Dobrov began to professionally exhibit his work in 1954. He thereafter was a regular participant in All-Union exhibitions and poster competitions. Dobrov’s thirty-year design career includes these poster titles: “Agricultural economics specialists! Our place is here!” (1954); “Glory to the Motherland of October!” (co-designed with Boris Reshetnikov), “Night is No Hindrance to Work!”; "Let's Make State Farms Profitable, High-Market, and Exemplary!" (all 1956), "Activists of the Soviet Red Cross! Fight for Cleanliness and Improvement of Cities and Villages!" and "Let's Electrify the Roads!" (both 1957), “10 Years of the German Democratic Republic” (1959), and others. Alexander Nikolaevich Dobrov was a member of the Union of Artists of the USSR.
Fuentes
Glushko, N. N., et al. (2007). Deti-nashe budushchee. Moskva: Rossiiskaia knizhnaia palata. (Pp. 236, 245, artist’s work cited)
Tramvaiiskusstv.ru (bio)
Painters.artunion.ru (dates of birth and death)