Kinetic Elements of Suprematism, 1920, Courtesy of Lazar Khidekel Society

Exhibition, Reception & Discussion

Date: July 9, 2014, 6:30pm – 9:30pm

Venue: Pushkin House, 5A Bloomsbury Square, London, WC1 2TA

Entry is free but spaces are limited.  RSVP essential.

Pushkin House welcomes you to join a reception and panel discussion with leading world-class specialists to commemorate the 110th Anniversary of the avant-garde artist and architect Lazar Khidekel (1904-1986), and to mark a new exhibition including original works at Pushkin House.

Lazar Khidekel worked closely with Marc Chagall, El Lissitzky and Kazimir Malevich in Vitebsk from 1918 to 1922, where he became an important proponent and theoretician of Suprematism and a founding member of the UNOVIS group (Affirmers of New Art), which included other notable artists such as El Lissitzky, Nina Kogan, Vera Ermolaeva, Ilya Chashnik, and Nikolai Suetin.

In the 1920s, Lazar Khidekel, the only architect in Malevich’s group, developed innovative ideas for futurist cities which included communal houses and Suprematist skyscrapers, suggesting a new way of life. Among his realized projects were socialist towns conjoining industrial and residential complexes (1930-1932), the first radio-theater, House of Radio, the first three-hall Movie Theater, as well as schools and educational institutions. Khidekel’s projects of the 1930s were granted landmark status in the 1960s.

The exhibition will include twenty original works from Khidekel’s early Suprematist period (1919-1924) as well as drawings, photographs, documents underpinning the UNOVIS (Affirmers of the Young Art) movement, publications, including the legendary AERO, a 1920s handmade book – one of the first ecological manifestos of the modern era. This rich set of material comes from the Khidekel Archive, one of the most comprehensive archives of the Russian avant-garde.

A documentary film Lazar Khidekel, Kanal Kultura, 2011, will also be on display.

Panel Discussion

Speakers: Christina Lodder, Brandon Taylor, Elena Sudakova, Xenia Vytuleva

Moderators: Maria Kokkori and Regina Khidekel

Moderated by Dr. Maria Kokkori and Dr. Regina Khidekel, the discussion gathers highly regarded  specialists in Russian avant-garde to explore suprematist painting and its development into architecture. Following key-note talks by Maria Kokkori and Regina Khidekel, Professor Christina Lodder  explain the relationship between Khidekel and Malevich as architects. Profesor Brandon Taylor will talk about the use of Suprematist and Constructivist ideas in more recent developments of modernism.

The panel discussion will focus on Lazar Khidekel’s suprematist work, and his contribution to the Russian avant-garde art and architecture. Also to be examined – his role in the transition of Suprematism from a 2-dimensional art form, to a movement which found its expresssion in real life – visible today in architecture, the processes of urbanization, and the futuristic yet environmentally-conscious city planning of the time.

For more information on speakers and Lazar Khiedekel’s work please visit the website.

> via russianartandculture.com