Alexandr Petrovich Apsit grew up amidst dire poverty and yet he received free instruction under the tutelage of the Saint-Petersburg painter, Lev Dmitriev-Kavkazskii.  By 1902, Apsit was noticed by the popular journals, including Rodina [Motherland], Zvezda [Star], and Niva, for which he produced sketches. He also illustrated the publications of writings by A.M. Gorkii, N.S. Leskov, and A.P. Chekhov, as well as those by D. Bedny, I.S. Nikritin, and M.E. S...

Pechatnik (Print Worker) Typolithography was formerly the Moscow publishing and printing house of Iosif Ivanovich Pashkov at 26 Khapilovskaia Street. By 1919, the printer was named the 8th (State) Typolithography, and it was under the management of the printing section of the MGSNKh (Moscow City Council of National Economy). Because the typolithgraphy was accorded the name Pechatnik, it is likely that it also served as the contract printer for the journal “Pechatnik”, the organ of the Mosc...

The publishing arm of the All-Russian Bureau of Military Commissars (VBVK) is historically considered to be the Bolsheviks' first centralized political organ for the Red Army. It was formed in April 1918 when the People’s Commissariat for Military Affairs issued a decree on the creation of military councils (soviets). This action established commissariats for military matters at the rural, provincial and district levels, and it also formed the All-Russian Bureau of Military Commissars that became th...