| Artist: | Malevich, Kasimir |
|
|---|---|---|
| Title of Work: | Suprematist Composition | |
| Date of Work: | c. 1915 | |
| Nationality: | Russian | |
| Context: | Hard-Edge Geometric Abstraction; pre-revolutionary Russia | |
| Movement: | Russian Suprematism | |
| Medium: | Oil | |
| Subject: the geometry gains more complexity as Malevich builds back up after reducing painting to the bare basics by painting a black square in 1913. Here we see varied hard-edge geometric forms on a tilted axis against a white field, one of a series of 35 Suprematist compositions Malevich exhibited in 1915, carrying abstraction to its ultimate geometric simplification. For him the squares represented only Suprematism: "the supremacy of pure feeling" in and of itself. Malevich removes specific subject matter by shifting away from representation and mimesis and towards the purity of mathematical geometry. "The square = feeling, the white field = the void beyond this feeling." Style: not gestural, not representational, no sign of personal touch; it is not about individual expression. Malevich suggests color bolts hurtling through space, leaving gravity far behind in a mystical leap. The geometry gets more complex here as Malevich creates the effect of multi-directional layered spatial movement; uses foreshortening and overlapping. It is all about structural dynamics rather than separate elements. Once Malevich grabs onto this tilted axis, he never lets go. The tilted squares add to a sense of implied (not depicted) movement, suggesting infinity and a flight from the material, physical world. Context: pre-revolutionary Russia; the Communist Revolution will happen in October 1917. The way in which Malevich does away with any representation of the material, physical world in this visionary, non-objective art parallels the way the revolution will do away with the hated old order. Envisioning a new reality on a higher plane; Malevich was a devout Christian mystic. For him, like Kandinsky, spirit and feeling rule over matter. Suprematism is his movement: "To the Suprematist, the visual phenomena of the objective world are, in themselves, meaningless; the significant thing is feeling, as such, quite apart from the environment in which it is called forth." Quite a bold leap into complete abstraction since Russian art was still stuck in naturalism and epic narrative painting (akin to a long Russian novel). Malevich knew about the European avant-garde through two sources: Shchukin's collection of Matisse and Picasso, and through Marinetti, the author of the Italian Futurist manifesto, who made two trips to Russia, in 1909-10 and 1914. Still, it must have taken great courage for Malevich to exhibit 35 hard-edge geometric abstractions, including this one, in 1915 under the title, "Suprematism." From that point on, until Stalin established an official style of Soviet Realism in 1932, Russia was the most progressive country in the world in terms of modern abstract art. | ||
