Class condemnation in Raisa Zenkova's painting “The Drones”, 1949

A painting by the Soviet woman artist and front-line veteran Raisa Zenkova, called "Drones", 1949. I cannot decide on the tone: is this still passive aggression or already the active kind? But the artist is plainly ill disposed towards at least two of the three heroines of this genre canvas. The class antagonism and condemnation are unmistakable, and in the realities of the day it is quite clear for which audience the message was intended. Lazybones, slatterns, exploiters and other obvious epithets suggest themselves. The author's sympathies lie with the poor, hard-working woman of advancing years, obliged to wait on all this disgrace. But if one thinks about it, is that grimace really deserved? The girls are primping at home, and whose business is it in what poses and with what expressions on their faces they sit? Yes, they are doing their make-up, yes, they want to look pretty, yes, they are cheerful and do not plan to bother today with the hardships of Soviet everyday life, and so what? Or do we equate the order in which stockings are folded with some sort of virtue? Or perhaps it would be more virtuous not to poke one's nose into closets closed to outside eyes?