Maria NESTEROVA-BERZINA

Maria Alexandrovna Nesterova-Berzina is a Soviet painter and graphic designer born in Samarkand. She began her career as a graphic designer by making advertising posters influenced by the ideas of Constructivism. In the late 1920s, Maria Nesterova-Berzina produced several posters for the state travel agency "Intourist" to present the USSR in a positive light abroad. These posters, influenced by the Art Deco style, present regions of the Soviet Union as well as various tourist activities, such as "Crimea" (1930), "Holidays" (1930), "Rest in the USSR" (1930), "Central Asia" (1934), "Hunting in the USSR" (1935), "Batum" (1936), "Baku" (1935-36), "Summer Sports in the USSR" (1936), and "Odessa". These posters are of high artistic quality, distinguished by their bold geometric shapes and varied colour palette. In the 1940s, Maria Nesterova-Berzina turned to the theme of sport and produced posters for winter sports such as "All on skis" (1941).

During the Second World War, she designed patriotic posters with a strong sense of tragedy and hatred of the enemy: "Papa kills the German! (1942), "No more planes at the front! (1942), "The Soviet people are harder than steel", "Victory" (1945), "Hail to Stalin's artillery!" (1945) or "Thank you for the liberation of the Fatherland!" (1945). In the post-war years, Maria Nesterova-Berzina continued to produce posters on the themes of sport, leisure and tourism for the Soviet regime. Maria Nesterova-Berzina's posters are held in numerous museums and private collections in Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States.