Page 44 - Studio International - October1968

New Russian The West has now discovered the art of the Negro, art is a self-contained, independent domain, or a
the Mexican, the Javanese, etc. They have not, of part of the whole remaining pattern of life. The
course, inquired of the Negro, the Mexican, the idea that art is a religion and the artist the priest of
art—a lecture Javanese, etc., what was the will which inspired this religion we rejected forthwith. We then went
the deed. They have taken the end-products and on to establish that expression and form in art are
given in1922 fabricated a theory of life into them, inventing a not eternal, and that no one epoch in art stands in
any relationship to the following one, and that in
philosophy of life for them; it is not the attitude to
life of the East that is manifested there, but the art there is no such thing as evolution.
reflection of the West. The question of whether art is really necessary has
Russia is not Africa, Mexico, or Java. We and the following significance in our country:
Western Europe are living in the same age, and In the new order of society, in which work will
not far distant from each other. This report is going cease to be slavery, in which there will no longer
El Lissitzky to furnish material for our theory of life. I should be small groups producing luxuries for a restricted
like to show here what has been achieved in our stratum of society, but where work is being done
country in recent years in the field of plastic by everyone for everyone, in such a society work is
design. I should like to examine the forces and the given free scope and everything which is produced
events which have directed this work into a is art. Thus the conception of art as something with
specific channel. its own separate existence is abolished. These views
are the basis of the development which we have
The Revolution accomplished in recent years. We have stopped just
Six years ago, in 1917, the Revolution broke out in rolling our eyes, we have turned our head round,
Russia, and not in Russia alone. The whole of the to face quite a different direction. We witnessed a
rest of the world stood against us, and thus we were sudden decisive change in all life's relationships;
completely isolated. Then it became clear to us a re-organization of the State, of the economy, of
This is first English translation of El Lissitzky's that the world was only just coming into existence, science; a miraculous technology; the invention
important survey of the arts in Russia in the period and everything must be re-created from scratch, of things which even yesterday were still considered
1917-1922. It is reproduced by kind permission from including art. At the same time the question arose as Utopian.
`El Lissitzkys' by Madame Lissitzky, to be published as to whether art is really necessary; whether the Where did art stand?
by Thames and Hudson on 21 October expression and the forms of art are eternal ; whether This question was posed only by the youngest
generation among us. The intellectuals, the highly-
educated, were expecting the 'new era' to arrive in
the shape of a Messiah, with aureole and white
robes, with manicured hands, mounted on a white
horse. But in reality the new era came in the shape
of the Russian Ivan, with tousled hair, tattered and
dirty clothes, barefoot, and with hands that were
bleeding and torn by work. These people did not
recognize the new era in an apparition like this.
They turned their backs on him, ran away and hid.
Only the youngest stayed put. But this youngest
generation was not born in October 1917; the
October Revolution in art originated much earlier.
In Russia, during her own individual Middle
Ages, there was a high standard of painting—in
the painting of icons. With the epoch of revolution
carried through by Peter the Great, Western
influences began to play a decisive role. But the
art of the West was itself on the downward path at
that time. It was certainly not in a position to
promote the growth of Russian art. There began a
long period of sterility. Art no longer grew
naturally from the people, but was cultivated from
the top downwards, by the State Academy. The
first standard of revolt against the Academy was
raised in 1865 by the so-called 'Wanderers', that is
to say those participating in the touring exhibitions,
the apostles of the 'naturalistic', educational paint-
ing. These popular wanderers were pushed aside
by the aristocratism of the group known as 'Mir
Iskusstva' (`World of Art'). The distinguishing
characteristics of this Petersburg group were
archaism of theme and a complete break with
painting, which was replaced by coloured illustra-
tion.
At the beginning of the twentieth century the
germination of a new culture of painting attracted
attention in Moscow. The place of germination is
significant. Moscow was not enervated by the
Petersburg Academy and had retained some
healthy blood of the people. There arose an inter-
relation between Russia and the international hot-
bed of the new art, Paris. In Moscow a new group
of painters was formed, the `Bubnovy Valet'
(`Knave of Diamonds') . Its members acknowledged
neither the elucidatory efforts of the 'Wanderers'
nor the rococo of the art world as the painter's
means of expression.
They believed the most elementary form for the
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