TIME REFLECTED IN A MAN

"Upon request. The Russian Avant-Garde Collection of the Regional Museums, 1900-1930. Part 3" is the title of yet another exhibition of the works of Russian avant-garde artists, interesting in its uniqueness of artistic and cultural significance. The event was organised and held in Baku on the initiative of the Heydar Aliyev Centre in close collaboration with the Jewish Museum, the Centre for Tolerance of Russia and the Moscow Museum of Modern Art.

The Heydar Aliyev Centre has long been a favourite visiting place for the residents and guests of Baku. Regular expositions held at the Centre are remarkable in terms of their cultural and education value.

The thirty-year period (1900-1930) covering the emergence, development and disappearance of the trend in Russian fine arts is represented by a multitude of artists, including the famous, little-known and generally unknown ones.

The exhibition presents the works in accordance with the avant-garde trends that existed in that period, which is very important for understanding the processes taking place in art and for perceiving the Russian avant-garde phenomenon in the visual arts of the early 20th century.

Genres such as cezannism, expressionism, suprematism/abstractionism, cubism/cubofuturism, neo-primitivism were represented by works of famous artists, including Marc Chagall, Vasily Kandinsky, Kazimir Malevich, Vladimir Tatlin, Alexandra Exter, Olga Rozanova, Yury Pimenov and the lesser known artists, such as Vladimir Baranov-Rossini (Shulim Wolf Leib Baranov writing under a pseudonym Daniel Rossine), Roman Semashkevich (Soviet painter and graphic artist of Belarusian origin, member of the Thirteens), Olga Rozanova, Solomon Nikitin (a member of the Jewish cultural association Culture League created in Kiev at the beginning of 20th century and others.

Creative rebellion or adventure of the XX century?

The phrase “an artist must be provocative” so popular in these days is most appropriate for the years 1900-1930, when the artists were in search for creative forms in visual arts, searches that could very clearly and accurately convey the artistic thought encoded in colours and compositions. This can be considered as a revolt or protest, as a revolutionary transformation of classical art, traditional into art, daring, modern, but bright in expressiveness of content and form. The beginning of the 20th century is a period of economic development and technology, which dictated its own rules and rights. Russian artists of both the Russian Empire and USSR began to break stereotypical views on visual arts, refuting the canonical laws of classical art. Realism was no longer honoured. Thus, they created a new, incomprehensible language for the adherents of the naturalistic classical school. Since then, anything that appears in contemporary art is called avant-garde. It happens that avant-garde is attributed not to genuine masterpieces, but to the phenomenon of mass culture. But the exhibition is about the time that has the property of regularity. That is why we now go through the times of the same search for artistic expression but in a new form. Artists of the 21st century also “protest”, trying to invent a new style, trend, direction.

Black square

Artistic in essence but still an adventure by Kazimir Malevich, who is known to the world with his Black Square followed by the Black Circle, is motivated by his search for suprematism and remains a role model even today. The exhibition at the Heydar Aliyev Centre presented another one of his works, Suprematism. Rectangle and Circle. It does not seems something special — just two geometric shapes, that's it! But people watch, move away and again return to the picture. Something attracts them. Did Kazimir Malevich think about this when he created a group of artists UNOVIS (The Approvers of New Art) in Vitebsk? Probably yes. Has he forecast such a force of attraction? We do not know. He spent all his time on the invention of a new method called suprematism, which became the natural continuation of cubo-futurism. But Malevich did not go alone along the path of searching. He gathered around him students, arranged with them discussions on philosophical topics, forcing them to think, to search for the meaning of the new art. The result of these efforts was the writing of the manifesto of UNOVIS, the basic principles of Suprematism, and it became clear that the goal of the artists was the creation of "pure pictorial image." What is it? Below are some quotes from a collection of his articles in the book Black Square:

"The black square has become a symbol of nihilistic denial of cultural wealth - the burden a man has ...

It is quite natural that you do not understand it. Can a person who always rides in a cab understand the experiences and impression of those traveling in express train or an airplane?

Art knows neither light nor darkness, both are equally beautiful, and both constitute a contrast that creates beauty; there is no white, no black, no left, no right, no front, no back, no facade.

They always demand that art is understandable, but they never demand from themselves to adapt their head to understanding..."

These few quotes seem to reflect the position of all avant-garde artists and are given only because Malevich is the most odious and prominent figure from the historical past of avant-garde art. And Black Square, in the opinion of new research by experts, is nothing more than evidence of a difficult creative search for the author, and not a surge in the artist's emotions, in the hearts of those who lame their unfortunate work on canvas. Experts claim that under a layer of paint specially made by Malevich from rare pigments, there are two of his works. Both coloured! The specialists managed to decipher even the title: The Battle of Negroes in a Dark Cave. But he needed just such an unusual black colour to reach the enchanting depth.

Message from the 20th...

Third in the title of the exhibition means the continuation of the first two, which were held in Russia. In Baku is the third one. This is great, because the exhibition was not just beautiful, but it organically fit into the cultural context and space of our city, giving fans of fine arts a chance for new discoveries. And, probably, a relationship of attitudes. We are also proud of our avant-garde artists, whose work was included in the treasury of national culture, became an integral part of the history of the development of national art, although it belongs not to the 30th, but to the 60th and 70th years of the 20th century. These include Mirjavad and his brother Tofig Javadov, Gorkhmaz Efendiyev, Ashraf, Murad and Rasim Babayev, Gena Brizhatyuk, and so on. Why the avant-garde has always had followers and been successful in Azerbaijan, although it was banned in the USSR as a genre alien to social realism?

Upon request

Almost all avant-garde artists have ended their lives tragically. Broken lives. We take their names back from the oblivion only now. 1919 is the heyday of Russian avant-garde. The works of some artists still cannot be found. Some works have remained forever abroad in private collections of unknown owners. But there are not indifferent people. People who need to return the names of their children to their homeland. Names upon request... And now the time has come for the claimed return. In 2016, the first exhibition of the collection of Russian avant-garde of regional museums of Russia of 1900-1930s was held in Moscow, and the second exhibition was held in 2017. 60 works collected from various museums of 17 Russian cities and returned to the audience. These works are important and necessary. Not only destinies, talent, originality of worldview, but also Time they hold inside: uneasy, ambiguous, dashing by changing ideals, attitudes and positions. In a word, the Time reflected in a Man and the Time that reflected a Man...