Aleksandr Rodchenko, Portrait of Lyubov Popova Undated Rodchenko and Stepanova Archives (Moscow, Russia). © Rodchenko and Stepanova Archives (Moscow, Russia)
Exhibition Review: Rodechnko and Popova - Defining Constructivism at Tate Modern, London, until May 17 2009. Admission £9.80 (£7.80 concessions).
In 1917 revolution swept through Russia. The established order of things ruptured as previously downtrodden societal forces seized control of the reigns of power. To reflect the huge changes occurring in every aspect of life, artists in the already highly creative Russian avant-garde movement began to change the way they viewed art and it’s place in society.
Out of this turmoil emerged Constructivism. In this movement, making art for its own sake, to be labelled as “art” and appreciated as such was no longer enough. The power of art had to be harnessed in the service of society to aid in its transformation and reorganisation. This art was not the product of the emotional, sensitive feelings of the artist but rather the construction of the rational, objective engineer.
Aleksandr Rodchenko and Liubov Popova were two leading figures in Constructivism, and played a large part in the debates that defined it. This exhibition includes work from their early years, right through until Popova’s death in 1924.
In the 12 rooms that make up the substantial show, the two artists work is given equal footing. It is Curator Dr Margarita Tupitsyn's aim to give each artist a “very equal power and contribution.”
All too often, she explains, women enter art history through their husbands, but with Popova we have an example of a woman artist who was celebrated in her lifetime by a Communist society where equality of the sexes was a central principle.
Mikhail Kaufman, Rodchenko standing in front of dismantled hanging spatial construction 1922. Zelda Cheatle © Zelda Cheatle. Photo: Mikhail Kaufman
As the rooms progress, a transformation takes place in the art that is on show, starting with more conventional paintings and exploding into many different mediums. The dynamic forms that Redchenko and Popova rendered were seen by them as an evolutionary language for an evolutionary society.
These paintings are fascinating and absorbing, though a certain dissatisfaction with the form is detectable. There is a sense the artists are banging at the boundaries of two dimensions, eager to start construction in a third.
Popova began to mix dust and wood chipping in with her oils to add a depth and texture to her work, rejecting conventional canvas in favour of plywood or cardboard.
Lyubov Popova, Painterly Architectonic 1918. Slobodskoye Museum and Exhibition Center
Her paintings are vibrant, bursting with movement. Rods criss-cross over a shifting irregular dark pattern, as if flying past each other on many different levels. There is a real sense of physicality here, of action on the physical plane rather than the ponderings of the mental or spiritual.
Rodchenko experimented in his own way. A painting from the Black on Black series illustrates his dissatisfaction with conventional composition. It is, as the name suggests, entirely black. Two gloss-black brush strokes glimmer dimly in the light over a dense matte-black background, and texture becomes everything.
In other works he explores his obsession with line. In 1920’s stark Construction no. 108, circles and lines intersect amidst a large black canvas. Made with the engineer’s tools of a ruler and compass rather than a paintbrush, it seems a more abstract representation of forces in motion, a product of reason and almost a diagram of sorts.
Aleksandr Rodchenko, Illustration for the magazine 'Young Guard' 1924. Rodchenko and Stepanova Archives (Moscow, Russia). © Rodchenko and Stepanova Archives (Moscow, Russia)
This experimentation comes to head with a series of three Rodchenko paintings that form a triptych: Pure Red Colour, Pure Yellow Colour and Pure Blue Colour. Part of a 1921 Moscow exhibition intended as a “farewell to painting”, the works are square canvases each completely covered by a single block colour.
“I reduced painting to it’s logical conclusion and exhibited three canvases: red, blue and yellow. I affirmed: it’s over. Basic colours. Every plane is a plane and there is to be no representation,” said Rodchenko of the works, which no doubt had an influence on the later American tradition of modern minimalist painting.
After this, the second half of the exhibition changes in tone completely. Thanks to Lenin’s New Economic Policy in 1921, private enterprise was allowed in Communist Russia, though on a limited scale. Seizing on this, Rodchenko began an advertising partnership with Futurist poet Vladmir Mayakovsky.
They worked for state-owned companies who were now in competition with private ones, designing everything from cigarette packaging to posters for biscuits. Many examples are collected here in a bewildering display of angle and colour, odd and exciting and completely different to the airbrushed perfection or faux naiveté of much of today’s advertising.
Rodchenko also took on other graphic design work, bringing his constructions to the masses on the cover of magazines, and in educational and political pamphlets. He even designed a poster for the classic propaganda film Battleship Potemkin, with its stylised silver cannon barrels almost bursting out of the paper.
Lyubov Popova, Cover for the catalogue of the exhibition '5x5=25' 1921 Collection of Vladimir Tsarenkov. © Collection of Vladimir Tsarenkov
Popova began designing sets for the theatre. The machine-like set for a play called The Magnanimous Cuckold is on display as an example, both as a small-scale model and in original photographs. It is an intriguing creation, a multi levelled, many-angled contraption with steps, wheels and rotor blades.
She also became known for her textile designs. On show are a number of patterns, as well as sketches of dresses. One dress has a blue brickwork outline over its simple and modest folds, suitable attire for any female comrade. Her popular designs could be seen as one of the few ways that Constructivism reached its goal of really engaging with the people.
Popova died of scarlet fever in 1924, at the age of 35. A cabinet is dedicated to the large posthumous exhibition of her work in Moscow that was put on in the same year, a testament to her talent and the Russian art world’s recognition of it.
The exhibition ends with a fully realised Workers Club in which visitors can wander into to relax in a productive manner. Based on Rodchenko’s 1925 design for a collective leisure space, this is no comfy beanbag laden chill-out zone but a highly functional room for workers at rest.
Strange high white seats that are very difficult to sit in comfortably are lined up next to a long grey and red central dais where books on the Russian Revolution have been helpfully scattered. In the corner is a chess table attached to two large blocky seats, one red one black.
Aleksandr Rodchenko, Cover Design for Marietta Shaginan’s “Novyi byt and Art” 1923Rodchenko and Stepanova Archives (Moscow, Russia). © Rodchenko and Stepanova Archives (Moscow, Russia)
What is most striking about Defining Constructivism is the unbridled creativity, breathless and innovative, on show. No project was too obscure not to benefit from the hands of the artists. Though it only covers roughly seven years, there is huge variety on offer, endless results from one central idea or method.
While Constructivism faltered in the 1930s thanks to adverse political pressure, these artists’ works and belief in the transformative power of art continues to inspire and invigorate.
