Soviet Cat Figurine

Ussr 1970-80, material wood, cm 4x9,5

This black cat figurine, with its vivid green eyes and sharply geometric silhouette, offers a small yet evocative window into late Soviet material culture. Produced in the USSR during the 1970s or 1980s, it reflects a design sensibility that blends abstraction with personality—a balance often sought in decorative objects of that era.

During this period, Soviet design increasingly embraced stylization and playful minimalism, particularly in items meant for domestic interiors. Figurines like this one—lacquered, often wooden, and strikingly modern in form—can be seen as part of a broader visual language that moved between folk tradition and modern graphic clarity. The cat's expressive face and stylized proportions suggest a desire to create charm without ornament.

These objects were part of a broader Soviet visual landscape—found in homes, gift shops, and occasionally exported—where they subtly reflected shifts in taste, production, and identity. Today, they offer collectors and cultural historians a glimpse of how aesthetic values adapted and endured within the ideological and material frameworks of the late Soviet years.

Simple in form yet rich in cultural resonance, this cat figurine stands as a small artifact of a time when even the most modest objects carried quiet reflections of style, symbolism, and history.

HO-04-0020 - available