[SOVIET UNION] [PHOTOGRAPHY] RODCHENKO, Alexandr

Moscow

Moscow and Leningrad: State Art Publishers, 1939. No Edition Stated. Quarto. 26cm. Publisher's ribbed maroon leatherette with the title embossed in gilt to the front board, gilt decoration to spine. Approx 250pp.Some wear and rubbing to the extremities, most noticeable at the spine ends, strong, robust, and handsome, internally clean, a very good, smart looking copy. Complete, with the two tipped in fold-out panoramas of historical renderings of Moscow, intended to allow readers to compare the vibrant new Moscow to the less streamlined and progressive city of the past.

With photography by Rodchenko, during a period when he was more concerned with painting, and text by his wife, Vavara Stepanova, this volume of stridently energetic images of Moscow, Muscovites, and the general beauty and order of the urban jewel of the Soviet Union was created for the New York World's Fair of 1939. This use of Rodchenko's photography occured during a time when criticism of his work as being 'too aesthetic' and not adequately serving the cause of Socialist Realism, was causing him some professional and political problems. His desire "to search inquisitively for new riches in the language of photography" frequently put him in a position where the taking of a photograph that fulfilled his artistic requirements placed him at odds with the artistic requirements of the Soviet artistic monolith, or at least the monolith it aspired to represent.
No expense seems to have been spared for this volume, and no publicity trope of Soviet Reality (tm) seems to have been overlooked; from clean streets and punctual public transport, to racks of healthy babies in a Moscow maternity ward, and laughing children behind the scenes at the State Theatre. Access is given to the production lines of the mighty factories of the Soviet industrial behemoth, with special emphasis on the way in which the workers of the USSR are encouraged to streamline and develop their own working methods and procedures, with the aim of constantly striving to increase productivity and labor output. Workers are smiling, proud, and uniformly enthusiastic, schoolchildren are clean and respectful, and avidly consuming Pushkin at age 7, and the rest of the world looks grubby, cluttered and chaotic in comparison, which was presumably the idea. Impressive, somewhat awe inspiring, and from a 21st century perspective rather grim, considering the carnage and chaos that was about to overwhelm the world. Fairly well represented in institutions, with some visible gaps, clean, tidy copies can be elusive. [KARASIK: The Soviet Photobook 1920-1941. Pages 464-465].

Price: $600.00

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