The people’s party of Bulgaria was the official name of the Bulgarian socialist republic that existed from 1946-1990. Communism is the philosophy behind the architecture, art and monuments I had been wildly photographing, being captivated as much by its aesthetics as ugliness.
I didn’t visit Sofia’s Museum of Socialist Art but did attend a similar one in Albania and was fascinated by the socialist realist paintings, especially their depiction of working women, quite a departure from the objectified women painted by masters in most western European galleries.
On recommendation, I attended a 3.5 hour Communist tour in Sofia; it felt like about 1.5 hours which reflects how my travelling is progressing; time seems to disappear when you slow down and stop thinking about it.
One of our first visits elucidated the curious mix of architecture and philosophies that permeated Sofia under Communism with its legacy being a dazzling array of architectural styles and purposes. The small church of Saint Nicholas Mirlikiysky from the 13th century is eclipsed by what is now a hotel built in the geometric simple style of the late 20th century under Communism.
Our guide Dino advised that he was aiming to give a balanced overview of Communism and this was supported through his discussion of socialist housing – everyone had free (yes free) housing, but it was the same housing for everyone. New housing was required to accommodate all the people who moved from the country to the city in search of work in the new factories that the Communist Party instigated.
I wondered how developed countries would go if more free housing was made available now, and how it might solve the problem of homelessness. Communism also provided free education resulting in a reduction in illiteracy and also allowed women to work.
We learnt about the role of spies and how Dino had a grandmother (or was it an aunt?) who was a spy and she was forced to dob in family members for being divergent or making the wrong joke. Later on, in a park near the infamous Monument to the Soviet Army, Dino was demonstrating how even having long hair was enough to get you into trouble when simultaneously, a long haired youth walked by behind him as if to demonstrate the point. Being young, he understood English and called back “Yeah, I would have been killed” before joining his other mates, all also sporting long hair and black metal band t-shirts, black being the most common colour worn by the young in Sofia. The grandiose Monument to the Soviet Army was meant to be a symbol of gratitude to the Soviet Red Army for helping Bulgaria during WW2. In Socialist Realist style, the top sculpture is heroic and figurative but the bottom friezes have been (sometimes humorously, as colourful superheroes) graffitied a few times and one is quite damaged. Surveillance cameras all around may put off guerrilla artists from any future antics.
We stood at a spot where a giant concrete mausoleum was built for Georgi Dimitrov the Communist leader in only six days to house his body. But then in 1999, numerous attempts were made to destroy it as Communism had ended, but almost no amount of explosives worked. I pondered the hypocrisy of so much money being spent on just one person, and how this could possibly be argued as the philosophy of Communism and how often idealist philosophies end up thwarted by mad and hypocritical dictators.
I was pleased to learn about the National Palace of Culture, a most gigantic modernist Brutalist building that I had walked past many times and photographed. It now shows various forms of performing arts with the largest banner I have ever witnessed advertising – Michael Bolton, showing that, along with the proliferation of McDonald's and Starbucks stores in Sofia, the end of Communism has opened up Bulgaria to the rest of the world, commercial as it is.
Naturally, Dino took us to that bit of Berlin Wall that has been stuck in a park like a trophy, but I wanted to know about those strange Dr Who-like funnel things all over town; I knew that they were air vents from the subway but why stick them there so prominently alongside sculptures, fixed in concrete like gallery plinths?
Unfortunately Dino had no answer to this, so I was left to simply enjoy and wonder about another of Sofia’s quirky and unintended architectural icons.
