Page 33 - Studio International - June 1974
P. 33

destroyed by perfection.') The theorist of Ego-
         Futurism underlines the new need to 'go beyond
         the limits' in which 'The Theatre', 'Painting',
         and 'Literature' are enclosed (the inverted
         commas are Ignatiev's). The new art, whose
         advent he awaits, like a prophet foretelling the
         coming of the Messiah, is 'possible' and even
         `inevitable' for 'the membrane of man is now
         capable of calling and replying intuitively to the
         calls of Unknown Countries'. Sharing a
         common symbolist heritage with Malevich, he
         glorifies intuition and comes to the point of the
         joyous proclamation of this new art, embodied
         by the symbol of the 'Zero' — 'if we want to
         represent it graphically' and which 'will be like
         Vassilisk Gnedov's last poem', this 'Poem of the
         End' where with the help of 'Nothing' the poet
         says 'everything'. This poem, in Ignatiev's eyes
         achieving 'the spatial movement beyond the
         word', was in fact silent, with only a title and no
         text. It was 'recited' by Gnedov with a slow
         movement of the hand which 'described a line,
         the hand going from right to left and back
         again', the opposing movements mutually
         annihilating each other, 'like the mathematical
         signs plus and minus', (Ignatiev, page 2). An
         artist's gesture has rarely appeared more
         significant for his time.


         The iconological mirror
         If we turn once more to Ouspenski's texts, we
         are not surprised to find a rich development of
         these themes during the same very decisive year
         of 1913. In his book, 'The Inner Circle' (St
         Petersburg, 1913) he combined two critical
         essays concerning respectively Arcybachev's
         novel 'The Final Limit' (1912) and the problem
         of the 'Superman'. The juxtaposition of these
         two texts in the same book has a result whose
         logical order and philosophical resonance cannot
         be ignored. If the second text takes an
         ostensibly Nietzschian direction, and can be
         considered as a conclusion and proposal for the
         future, the first is the analytical stage,
         specifically concentrated on the problem of
         `limits', those of the real world where analytical   Portrait of I. Kljan
         over-excitement leads to suicide and that of   Drawing 1913                         questioned in our eyes. Matiouchine already
                                                   Private collection
         conceptual impotence condemning men to the                                          abundantly quoted Ouspenski in his article for
         positivist limits of a materially 'objective'   philosophical foundation of Russian Futurism,   the third publication of the Union of Youth, to
         condition. The first text, concentrated on the   as shown in its trans-rational climax of the   explain the ideas of Gleizes and Metzinger
         criticism of Arcybachev's novel, concerns the   autumn of 1913: the rejection of the old logic;   found in 'Cubism'. We have also seen other
         problem of suicide, which is the theme of this   movement towards a new deductive logic   texts by Matiouchine showing the undeniable
         literary work. In contrast to Arcybachev, whose   (therefore anti-naturalist), based on an   influence of Ouspenski on his system of thought:
         pessimism, leading all the characters in the   intuitive intelligence; the movement beyond the   an article on 'The meaning of the fourth
         novel to suicide, is accused of 'positivist limit',   limits of language, the arrival at the stage of the   dimension' (winter 1912-1913), a text on 'The
         Ouspenski insists on the creative possibilities of   infinite (philosophical) best illustrated by the   Sign' and another article on the `miraloid'
         man, who must not stop at the stage of simple   theory of the 'fourth dimension'. The   quality of forms.17a Following his summertime
         negation of the materialist order (sensorial non-  importance of Ouspenski's ideas for the   stay with Matiouchine, Alexei Krouchenykh
         conceptualized perception) but must be capable   evolution of Russian Futurism in 1913 seems   published a theoretical manifesto on 'the new
         of going beyond this limit and 'achieving the   paramount, for this evolution, one of whose key   paths of the word' in the collection Three
         negation of negation', from whence stems the   moments can be pin-pointed with the conception   (Troe), published in September 1913.
         possibility of affirming a 'new relationship with   of Victory over the Sun in July 1913,   This declaration of transrational language
         life'. In this way we 'become aware of a new   corresponds with an astonishing similarity to   (zaoum) reproduces word for word
         conception of the world', excluding the illusion   the statement in Ouspenski's texts and those of   certain passages of Tertium Organum  17b
         of deceptive perceptions. This world of 'the   Tertium Organum (1911) in particular.   and thus establishes a further link between
         superior reality' is defined by Ouspenski with   Matiouchine's role in introducing Malevich and   Futurism and Ouspenski's ideas. It is also
         all the qualities which make up the       Krouchenykh to Ouspenski's ideas cannot be    useful to remember that this collection contains
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