Cultural Itineraries

Go directly to fullscreen view of the Neatline exhibit

This 1986 map of Moscow was produced by Intourist for the English-speaking tourist and – like every tourist map – is an attempt to put Moscow's best face forward for foreigners. It highlights the city's historic sites and museums and indicates hotels and embassies. In a uniquely Soviet touch, it also pointed out for the visitor sites that only an apparatchik would consider can't-miss: the Automotive Industry Ministry, Gosplan, even the KGB. And its simple, bold iconography, regular angles and polygons, and solid blocks of color create the overall impression of an orderly, stable Soviet capital. But with the benefit of hindsight, 1987 Moscow evokes a whole different set of associations: perestroika and glasnost, bubbling dissent, artistic and cultural ferment, dramatic political and economic changes that would bring about the dissolution of the entire country in just four years. Tourists presumably used this map up to 1991 (and probably beyond), but it indicates nothing of the monumental shifts taking place just behind this facade of stability. Here we look behind the facade and examine what else was going on in Moscow in the perestroika period.

Cultural Itineraries