(movement, 1956-1986)
Soviet dissident art from the historical Cold War period (1956-1986)—from Khruschev’s cultural “thaw” to Gorbachev’s glasnost and perestroika. Soviet artists working in opposition to the government-prescribed style of Social Realism risked personal safety, imprisonment, and exile in their quest for individual expression. Other terms used to refer to this phenomenon are “unofficial art” or “underground art.”