It took the revolution of 1905 to unleash the tremendous satirical potential in Russian political art. During the brief interlude between 1905 and 1907, when a relatively free press emerged for the first time in Russia, 249 new satirical journals were published, containing about 3,000 satirical cartoons. What made these satirical publications so distinctive was their critical stance towards the tsarist government. Trenchant caricatures appeared in the pages of these journals, some of them by major contemporary artists or younger men, such as Moor, who would soon become prominent Soviet poster artists.

The Bolsheviks equipped and mobilized agitational propaganda trains during the Civil War, sending them to all parts of Russia to inform the population about the ongoing struggles in defence of the revolution and to help organise lectures, meetings and discussions on the meaning of the new workers' state.

The first train named after Lenin, went into service on August 13, 1918. Others soon followed, bearing titles such as "October Revolution", "Red East", "Soviet Caucasus" and "Red Cossack". The carriages were famously decorated with paintings, graphic or satirical, on subjects that reflected the names of the trains and the places where they were headed.

For the masses, propaganda had to be simple, categoric, direct. Within a short time all forms of printing - books, newspapers, pamphlets, and posters - were in the hands of the State Publicity Corporation, which controlled not only the publishing operations but the printing machinery and paper supply. It was endowed with a censorship department which examined all book manuscripts, film scripts, drawings, music, and even maps. On November 12, 1920, the Main Political Education Committee of the Republic was set up, branches of which were attached to the political division of every region, district, town and village.