Soviet brochure from Expo '58: "Come Visit the USSR! Soviet Women! Sputniks and Rockets!"

Here's a neat bit of paper ephemera: A brochure of the Soviet pavilion at Expo 58, also known as the Brussels World Fair—which was the first World Fair after World War II. The Soviet pavillion brochure includes period-perfect illustrations, a neat map, and promises of love 'n' leisure in the land of the Reds: "Sputniks and Rockets! Soviet Women!"

Scanned and published to Flickr by user Jericl Cat

(via BB Submitterator, via metkere.com)

Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

MORE: advertising • Art and Design • design • Vintage Weird • war • Weird

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sergeirichard

There’s something heartbreakingly innocent about these designs.
Coxswain

is it bad that the first thing i thought when i saw the bit about the north pole tent was “oh, hey, top gear wasn’t the first group to take cars to the north pole after all!” ?
Thad E Ginataom

Damn!

But then… I was only six at the time.
Anonymous

Ahh Soviet women and their Yakovlev Yak-ing, how I miss them.
Anonymous

For me, as an American, the Soviet women, food, shelter, healthcare and lack of a plutocracy would have been the strongest selling points. The censorship and oligarchical bureaucracy, not so much.
Sapa

In a country where women are given credit for their intelligence this ad may have been directed not at men but at the women themselves. The attitude of this comment displays how lacking some cultures are.

for the small-brained an example: “SOVIET MEN” would this be directed only at the female populace?
Anonymous

Old Times. I was there. The Sovient pavillion sign said URSS. I’ve always wondered if French could have been bent enough for the sign to say RUSS.

The Automium is about the only thing left standing I think.
Marco Mustapic

Sputniks AND The Atomium?! Best expo ever!
ackpht

Except that on the “visitor’s route” suggested on the map, women are dead last at location 12. The savvy visitor could visit “Soviet Women” before “Sport and Leisure”- then “Children” and “Education” follow logically.
- Sapa
  
  dammit
Nadreck

Ah, those Ukraine girls really knock me out: they leave the West behind….
bjacques

Come see for yourself, tovarishch! You are also checking out real boss Ice-9 refinery on Big Diomede! You can see Alaska from here! For decadent western imperialists with only one thing on their minds, Soviet Woman is on right.
Halloween Jack

Soviet woman, get away from me-hee…
Anonymous

Looks like this pavilion was a way to get western hard currency.
Rachel H

Is it wrong that I can’t help but read the brochure in my head with a thick, fake Russian accent?
Rich Keller

Is that a blond Astro Boy with her or the Ur-Calvin?

I like the lino cut quality these have. Some of the others look like cocktail napkin illustrations.
MrJM

Come for the ladies, stay for the electrodrills!
thequickbrownfox

Stalin managed to crush the avant-garde in literature and music and return these forms to crude nationalistic and militaristic themes, but the revolutionary graphic styles of constructivism and suprematism seemed to escape his dull vision and became the national aesthteic format for graphis design.
dross1260

26 models of television sets!
- Anonymous
  
  No, that wasn’t 26 models of TVs; it was 26 TVs, the total output of sets from the Second 5-year Plan.
Gilbert Wham

Yes. Yes, I want to see all these things. Take me to them.
penguinchris

It’s awesome but what strikes me is the technological bent. Sure, Sputnik would be a big draw, but the rest of the stuff? *I* think it all sounds awesome, yes, but it’s no surprise they threw in “soviet girls” as well :)

And if there were such an exposition today, how very, very different it would be… no one would be interested in any of that kind of stuff. I guess I should look up what’s at the expo in Shanghai – all I’ve seen regarding that is the architecture (which is amazing) but not what’s actually at the various pavilions.
- Jonathan Badger
  
  I went to the 1982 World’s Fair in Knoxville, TN and one of the Eastern Bloc countries (East Germany? Hungary?) had the focus of their pavilion be a more efficient form of air conditioning. It was actually on topic for the fair as the theme was energy conservation, but the pavilion was nearly empty — just not exciting enough, I guess.
Anonymous

I’m sold.
Anonymous

Most countries enticing tourists don’t try to make their women look harsh and severe. I guess the Soviets were going for the niche market that prefer women who don’t smile.