Sergey Grigoryev’s 1950 painting “Discussion of a Bad Mark” and Soviet upbringing

Discussing a Fail Mark, 1950, Sergey Grigoryev, Stalin Prize. The canvas is criticised for the parallelism of its lines to the picture plane, the primitive arrangement of its figures and its simplified palette. The artist's merit lies rather in outlining the genre's range and shaping a style for depicting the stages of communist upbringing. I do not know what feelings the painting stirs in you, but I wanted to thank God that I happened to study at a time when there was no political enlightenment, no pioneer detachment councils, no kissing of the banner, and not yet any prison terms for insulting the authorities, no political-information lessons under the cover of social studies, no pro-government youth movements and other such lunacy. As for the reproduction of Oreshnikov's «Lenin at the Examination» on the wall, it merely spoils the tidiness of the message: Lenin, after all, stands before ideologically alien opponents, whereas Grigoryev's hero seems to be among friendly comrades, or perhaps not after all, and it would be worth looking closer for a possible allusion to the composition of the Last Supper, in which the lad under discussion would stand in the place of Christ, and his accuser in the place of Judas?