Fallen Monument Park (Muzeon)

Muzeon Art Park, adjacent to Gorky Park, is an outdoor sculpture park that grew up around the collection of Soviet-era monuments removed from public squares after 1991. The result is one of the most distinctive open-air spaces in Moscow: hundreds of sculptures, from classic Socialist Realist heroes to contemporary works, scattered through parkland along the Moskva River.

The Communist-era section is the most unusual — Stalin and his subordinates stand in disarray, some toppled, some weathered, some defaced, surrounded by more recent additions. The contemporary sculpture section has works by leading Russian artists. The park is free to enter and is combined naturally with a visit to Gorky Park or the New Tretyakov Gallery nearby.

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A story
After the 1991 coup failed and the Soviet Union began to dissolve, statues of Stalin, Lenin, and other Communist-era figures were pulled down across Russia. Many of them ended up here — tumbled, sometimes broken, arranged in a field behind the Central House of Artists. A fallen Stalin lies in a ditch. A headless Lenin stands next to a full-sized one. The park did not intend to be a museum of the fallen empire, but it became one.

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