Jean Badovici, ed.
L ARCHITECTURE RUSSE EN URSS, Première série. Jean Badovici, ed. Paris : Albert Morancé, (1928) Quarto folio 28x23 cm., decorated boards. The first of a three-part series. The first part includes plates from two earlier issues of L architecture vivante. Works by Rodchenko, Vesnin, Stenberg bros., Melnikov, Kholostenko, Lissitzky, Iakulov, Khidekel, and others. Very good cover with ties, interior near fine.
Anatpol Stern & Mieczyslaw Berman
Quarto 28x23 cm., decorated cloth, 192 pp., errata sheet, in original dust wrapper; copiously illustrated throughout. Polish language text. The first full monograph and memoir on Mieczyslaw Szczuka, (1890-1927), visual genius and lodestar of the avant-garde in Poland, edited by two of his closest friends who worked with Szczuka and were leaders of the avant-garde in Warsaw. Stern was a author of the poem Europa, Szczuka'a last, great unfinished work, and Berman continued to be a leading figure in fine art and commercial design; both of them continued to actively work into the 1960s. An important reference work.
Josef Vachal
Woodcuts to Mystics and Visionaries. A Cycle of Woodcuts from the Period of 1911-1913. Folio in wrappers (21-5/8 x 15-3/8 inches), prints are 8-1/4 x 8-1/4 inches. Five woodcuts saluting the life of mystics and seers: Strom Zivota (The Tree of Life), Cornelius Agrippa, Jakob Boehme, Angelus Silesius and Katarina Emmerichová, all loose as issued, in paper folio with titles and artist's signature on rear cover. Each print bears Váchal's blind-stamp. These were selected from the original printing of ten images under the title Mystikové a visionari. First edition thus. A number of books and catalogues attribute one image from this set to William Blake, from the mistaken attribution in the great 1994 Váchal memorial exhibition. That refers to another of the original ten and we offer it separately; please inquire. The edition itself, without note of limitation, comes from a later date than the first release in 1913 and was released sometime around 1923. This later edition suggests the selection Váchal chose as the best of the original set. Josef Vachal (1884-1969) was a Czech painter, printmaker, book artist and writer, visionary and idiosyncratic. He is sometimes called the Czech William Blake because of the parallels to the great British artist found in his poems and book making. He occupies a unique place in Czech modern culture. He celebrated Pagan, magical and alchemical traditions with intense spirituality and burning social criticism. An outsider all of his life, he was recognized as an Artist of Merit by the state in his last year as a small token of esteem. OCLC locates two institutional holding worldwide (Thomas Fischer Toronto, Northwestern Univ).
Waldemar George
Quarto 29x23 cm., original stiff wrappers, 16 pp., 32 plates. Number 155 of 300 numbered copies on vellum (15 were issued on Holland). Borys Solomonovich Aronson (1898-1980) was a renowned scenic designer for Broadway and Yiddish theater in the United States. Less known about him was his important role in the development of the avant-garde from his beginning in Kiev, then Moscow and Berlin. He was an apprentice to Aleksandra Ekster who introduced him to Vsevelod Meyerhold and Aleksander Tairov. With those three he worked to develop Constructivist theater in the early Soviet era. Soon Aronson went to Berlin where he collaborated with El Lissitzky and Naum Gabo to introduce Constructivism to the West. He obtained an immigrant visa to the USA in 1923 and settled in New York where he designed sets and costumes for the experimental Yiddish theater. It is in this era that the present work places its focus, drawing on the continuity of Aronson's Suprematist and Constructivist origins to the date of writing. Waldemar George (1893-1970) was a Polish born art critici active in France who introduced Eastern European art to Western readers. Plates include costume designs (4 in color), drawings, production photos, and stage designs. Uncommon, OCLC locates two holdings in North America (FL Intl Univ, LAPL)/ {Professional spine restoration; a crisp copy.
Iakov Chernikhov
(Architectural Fantasies. 101 Compositions in Color, 101 Architectural Miniatures, Realized with the Participation of D. Kompanitsyn and E. Pavlova.) Quarto 30.5x21.5 cm., embossed cloth, 102pp., 101plates, released in 3000 copies. Iakov Chernikhov (1889-1951) is known for his theoretical works which are encapsulated in the books he published from 1927 to 1933. As an architect, very few of his conceptions were realized and he spent most of his life in teaching positions at design institutes throughout his professional life. The present work is acknowledged to be the last publication of avant-garde design in Stalinist Russia. It is an amazing feat, with 101 color plates of visionary drawings executed by the author and two design assistants. It also contains numerous black & white renderings, equally remarkable in scope. This work, a statement of publishing excellence and daring architectural vision appeared in spite of the narrowing options left for designers under increased Party strictures. They would soon jell into the dreary Neoclassicism that pervaded the USSR under Stalin. Chernikhov was censured soon after the book's release. One later work, The Construction of Letter Forms, appeared posthumously in 1959. As a working contemporary with Soviet designers, Chernikhov had a great interest in Futurism, Constructivism, and a real affinity with Suprematism; he was a friend of Malevich. But he was too much of an individual with many visual concerns and dimensions to explore to be subsumed into a school other than his own. He emphasized that design must start with pure abstraction. Many of the architectural fantasies in this book are sheer exercises in pure form. These were meant to serve for the bases of extraordinary structures, most beyond the technology of the day for realization. These and other Chernikhov designs have inspired architects and designers starting in the 1980s when there was a reevaluation of Constructivism and Suprematism in Post-modernist circles and individual design pioneers which continue to the present day. This copy with some spine fading, else near fine.
Vladimir Mayakovsky, Gen. ed., with Sergei Tret iakov; Aleksandr Rodchenko, art director
Octavo 22x15 cm., original wrappers, 48pp. A second year of this journal of art and culture in the rapidly shifting bodies of state support, where the dictates of a socialist art, now laced with costructivism, stresses the function of art to serve the state, continues to evolve. Aleksandr Rodchenko's presence dominates the visual content. The journal ran for two years from 1927 to 1928. Mayakovsky was the editor-in-chief from 1927 but dropped out in the second year due to a conflict with Tret'iakov over policy. Cover design by Rodchenko. Contributions by Mayakovsky, Aseev, Brik, Arvatov, Shklovskii, Trenin, Tret'iakov; Photos by Rodchenko. Fine cop
Vladimir Mayakovsky, Gen. ed., with Sergei Tret iakov; Aleksandr Rodchenko, art director
Octavo 22x15 cm., original wrappers, 48 pp. A critical second year of this journal of art and culture in the rapidly shifting bodies of state support. Aleksandr Rodchenko's presence dominates the visual content. The journal ran for two years from 1927 to 1928. Mayakovsky was the editor-in-chief from 1927 but dropped out in the second year due to a conflict with Tret'iakov over policy. Cover design by Rodchenko. Contributions by Aseev, L. Tolstoi, N. Chuzhak,O. Brik, Pertsov, Shklovskii, Trenin Rodchenko, Tret'iakov; Photos by Rodchenko, Nekrasov. Fine copy
Vladimir Mayakovsky, Gen. ed., with Sergei Tret iakov; Aleksandr Rodchenko, art director
Octavo 22x15 cm., original wrappers, 48pp. A critical second year of this journal of art and culture in the rapidly shifting bodies of state support. Aleksandr Rodchenko's presence dominates the visual content. The journal ran for two years from 1927 to 1928. Mayakovsky was the editor-in-chief from 1927 but dropped out in the second year due to a conflict with Tret'iakov over policy. Cover design by Rodchenko. Contributions by Aseev, Arvatov, O. Brik, Shklovskii, Trenin, Tret'iakov; Photos by Rodchenko, Nekrasov. Fine copy
Vladimir Mayakovsky, Gen. ed., with Sergei Tret'iakov; Aleksandr Rodchenko, art director
Octavo 22x15 cm., original wrappers, 48pp. critical second year of this journal of art and culture in the rapidly shifting bodies of state support. Aleksandr Rodchenko's presence dominates the visual content. The journal ran for two years from 1927 to 1928. Mayakovsky was the editor-in-chief from 1927 but dropped out in the second year due to a conflict with Tret'iakov over policy. Cover design by Rodchenko. Contributions by Aseev, Arvatov, O. Brik, Shklovskii, Trenin, Tret'iakov; Photos by Rodchenko, Nekrasov. Fine copy
N.F. Popov-Sibiriak, ed.
Quarto 29.5x21.5 cm., wrappers, 32pp. 1924-1941. Stroitel'stvo Moskvy is a significant document of soviet architecture and design for the era. Issues through the mid-1930s employ bold typographic experiments and page design. It also became a forum for urban planning, mass housing and monumental construction, in theory and practice between leading architects, engineers and thinkers (e.g., Moisei Ginzburg, Anatoly Lunacharsky). Eventually Soviet orthodoxy and Neoclassicism prevailed and experimental graphics disappeared. 1931-6, July 1931. Cover photocollage by Lavrov and Popov; Articles by G. Khavin, N. Miliutin, G. Vizirian, N. Yegorev, A. Fridliand,S. Khotchinskii, A.T. Rubin, K.O. Berzin, V. Kuzminskii. Ex-library, stamps, else VG+
Octabo 21.5x18 cm., illustrated wrappers, (10) pp. Drawings by L. Iudin. A wonderful collaboration between OBERIU pioneer and absurdist Aleksandr Vvedenskii and Lev Iudin in a most original, brilliant work for children. Lev Aleksandrovich Iudin (1903-1941) was a Vitebsk native who joined UNOVIS with Malevich and later studied at VKHUTEMAS, then worked in the Theoretical Dept of GINKhUK (State Institute of Art Culture), also with Malevich. Overlooked by historians, Iudin was an important artist contributing to the avant-garde art world of the early Soviet era. Vvedenskii (1904-1941) was a key figure, along with Daniil Kharms, in forming the most extreme and last avant-garde movement in Soviet Russia known as OBERIU. Outside of their writings for children s books all of their work was suppressed, leaving this to be their only outlet to work with relative safety, and then only for a time. Vvedenskii allegedly couldn t stand children, but nevertheless produced some of the best children s books in Russian literature. Worldcat locates three holdings in North America (Harvard, Columbia, Univ Chicago). This copy very good. An important document. This copy trimmed 1x2 cm. affecting some images, and priced accordingly.
