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Lissitzky Lazar Markovich is one of the outstanding representatives of the Russian and Jewish avant-garde. He contributed to the emergence of Suprematism in architecture.

Lazar Mordukhovich Lissitzky was born into the family of a craftsman-entrepreneur assigned to the Dolginovsky philistines, Mordukh Zalmanovich (Mark Solomonovich) Lissitzky (1863-1948) and a housewife Sarah Leibovna Lissitzky. Then the family moved to Vitebsk, where Lazar attended Yudel Pan's private drawing school.

He graduated from the Alexander Real School in Smolensk (1909). He studied at the Faculty of Architecture of the Higher Polytechnic School in Darmstadt, while studying he worked as a bricklayer. In 1911-1912. traveled extensively in France and Italy. In 1914 he defended his diploma with honors in Darmstadt, but due to the outbreak of the First World War he was forced to hastily return to his homeland (via Switzerland, Italy and the Balkans).

In order to engage in professional activities in Russia, in 1915 he entered the Riga Polytechnic Institute as an external student, evacuated to Moscow during the war. In Moscow during this period he lived at Bolshaya Molchanovka 28, apartment 18, and in Starokonyushenny Lane 41, apartment 32. He graduated from the Institute on April 14, 1918 with the title of engineer-architect. Diplomagiven to Lissitzky on May 30 of the same year, is still kept in the State Archives of Russia.

In 1916-1917. worked as an assistant in the architectural bureauabout Velikovsky, then from Roman Klein. Since 1916, he participated in the work of the Jewish Society for the Encouragement of Arts, including in collective exhibitions of the society in 1917 and 1918 in Moscow and in 1920 in Kyiv. Then, in 1917, he began illustrating books published in Yiddish, including modern Jewish authors and works for children. Using traditional Jewish folk symbols, he created a brand for the Kyiv publishing house "Yidisher folks-farlag" (Jewish folk publishing house), with which he signed a contract on April 22, 1919 to illustrate 11 books for children.

In the same period (1916), Lissitzky took part in ethnographic trips to a number of cities and towns of the Belarusian Dnieper region and Lithuania in order to identify and fix Jewish antiquity monuments; the result of this trip were the reproductions of the murals of the Mogilev synagogue at Shkolishche published by him in 1923 in Berlin and the accompanying article in Yiddish "װעגן דער מאָלעװער שול: זכרונות" (Memoirs of the Mogilev synagogue, the magazine "Milgroym") - the only theoretical decorative work dedicated to the Jewish artist art.

In 1918, in Kyiv, Lissitzky became one of the founders of the Kultur-League (Yiddish: League of Culture), an avant-garde artistic and literary association that aimed to create a new Jewish national art. In 1919, at the invitation of Marc Chagall, he moved to Vitebsk, where he taught at the People's Art School (1919-1920).

In 1917-1919, El Lissitzky devoted himself to illustrating works of modern Jewish literature and especially children's poetry in Yiddish, becoming one of the founders of the avant-garde style in Jewish book illustration.In contrast to Chagall, who gravitated towards traditional Jewish art, since 1920, under the influence of Malevich, Lissitzky turned to Suprematism. It is in this vein that the later book illustrations of the early 1920s were made, for example, to the books of the Proun period “אַרבעה תישים” (see photo, 1922), “Shiefs Map” (1922, see photo), “ייִנגל-צינגל- כװאַט" (verses by Mani Leib, 1918-1922), Rabbi (1922) and others.Lissitzky's last active work in Jewish book graphics (1922-1923) belongs to the Berlin period of Lissitzky.After returning to the Soviet Union, Lissitzky no longer turned to book graphics, including Jewish ones.

Since 1920, he performed under the artistic name "El Lissitzky". He taught at the Moscow VKHUTEMAS (1921) and VKHUTEIN (since 1926); in 1920 he joined GINHUK.

In the workshop of Lissitzky, the project "Lenin's Tribune" (1920-1924) was completed. In 1923, he completed sketches for an unrealized production of the opera Victory over the Sun.

In 1921-1925 he lived in Germany and Switzerland; joined the Dutch group "Style".

urban development (projects of "horizontal skyscrapers" for Moscow, 1923-1925).

In 1930-1932, according to the project of El Lissitzky, a printing house for the Ogonyok magazine was built 55°46′38″ s. sh. 37°36′39″ E d.HGЯO (house number 17 on the 1st Samotechny Lane).Lissitzky's printing house is distinguished by an amazing combination of huge square and small round windows. The building in plan looks like a sketch of Lissitzky's "horizontal skyscraper".

Lissitzky made several propaganda posters in the spirit of Suprematism, for example, “Beat the whites with a red wedge!” (1920); designed convertible and built-in furniture in 1928-1929. He created new principles of exhibition exposition, perceiving it as an integral organism. An excellent example of this is the All-Union Printing Exhibition in Moscow (1927).

He was fond of photography, in particular, photomontage. One of the best images of this area is a poster for the "Russian Exhibition" in Zurich (1929), where a cyclopean image of two heads, merged into a single whole, rises above generalized architectural structures.​

The first Soviet designer and artist El Lissitzky entered the history of Russian art as a co-founder of Suprematism, book illustrator and photographer. He participated in the publication of such magazines as Metz, Brum, Veshch, taught at the Moscow Vkhutemas and Vkhutein, was an active member of the Dutch art group De Stil, which united prominent representatives of avant-garde and neoplasticism. Against the backdrop of the artistic achievements of Lazar Markovich (El is a pseudonym that the artist took after he became an adherent of Suprematism), his unrealized projects in the field of architecture and urban planning theory become unique. These projects are of particular value today, when urbanization and a properly developed city policy are the key to the successful development of the city.

The architectural activity of Lissitzky concentrated around urban planning problems and the correct zoning of the urban environment. A certified architect (Lissitzky is a graduate of the Higher Technical School in Darmstadt), Lazar Markovich from the very beginning of his career took the path of a radical reform of the existing laws of architecture. In his diary, he wrote: “We were brought up by the age of inventions. ... We have become conscripts of the era of a new beginning of human history ... ". It was architecture that was to become the means by which Lissitzky was going to bring humanity to a new stage of existence. How? Definitely, without the help of engineers, builders, complex drawings and mathematical laws. Lissitzky's answer is simple: with the help of art.

Having become interested in Suprematism quite early, Lissitzky remained true to its principles all his life: he was the author of propaganda posters (“Beat the whites with a red wedge!”) And the decorator of theatrical performances made in the style of Suprematism, and even published a book for children “Suprematist tale about two squares”, in which the central place is occupied not by text, but by geometric shapes - squares, rectangles and circles painted in the main colors of the spectrum. The artist considered Suprematism as a socially significant component of public life. Experimenting with Suprematist compositions, Lissitzky sought to translate the principles of Suprematism from artistic language into practical language.

Soon, the architect managed to create a universal Suprematist unit, which formed the basis of his urban utopia project. This basis was "proun" - a project for the approval of the new. The author defined proun as "transfer station from painting to architecture". Depicting the proun on paper, stretching, rotating and distorting the figure, Lissitzky never considered it as a geometric figure on the plane. For him, proun has become a new model, a revolutionary form in urban planning.

Subsequently, on the basis of prouns, Lissitzky developed a project for a whole utopian city: “We set ourselves the task of a city - a single creative cause, a center of collective effort, a radio mast that sends an explosion of creative efforts into the world: we will overcome the fettering foundation of the earth in it and rise above it ... this dynamic architecture will create a new theater of life…”.

Perhaps, if you peer into one of Lissitzky's geometric compositions, you will be able to see this city floating in the sky, where houses do not grow in height, but, horizontally, in length. Horizontal skyscrapers stand on three abutments-frameworks: one of them went deep underground and served as a subway stop, and trams stopped at the others.

The revolutionary ideas of Lissitzky were not destined to come true. The project of horizontal skyscrapers was rejected as too abstract and not taking into account the modern architectural problems of Moscow. Today, the memory of Lissitzky the architect is immortalized in only one building built according to his design - the printing house of the Ogonyok magazine.

Lazar Markovich (Mordukhovich) Lissitzky (* November 22, 1890 - † December 30, 1941) - Soviet artist and architect, also commonly known as "El Lissitzky".

El Lissitzky is one of the outstanding representatives of the Russian and Jewish avant-garde. Together with Kazimir Malevich, he developed the foundations of Suprematism.

In 1918, in Kyiv, Lissitzky became one of the founders of the Kultur-League (Yiddish: League of Culture), an avant-garde artistic and literary association that aimed to create a new Jewish national art. In 1919, at the invitation of Marc Chagall, he moved to Vitebsk, where he taught at the People's Art School (1919-1920).

In 1917-1919, Lissitzky devoted himself to illustrating works of modern Jewish literature and especially children's poetry in Yiddish, becoming one of the founders of the avant-garde style in Jewish book illustration. In contrast to Chagall, who was inclined towards traditional Jewish art, from 1920 Lissitzky, under the influence of Malevich, turned to Suprematism.

Lissitzky died of tuberculosis in December 1941. His last work was the "Give Us More Tanks" poster. He was buried at the Donskoy cemetery in Moscow, along with his father Mark Solomonovich, his brother Reuben and his wife Lelya.

Izvestia ASNOVA, 1920s

In 1926, under the editorship of L. Lissitzky and N. Ladovsky, the first issue of Izvestia ASNOVA (Association of New Architects) was published, which included Ladovsky's article "Fundamentals of Building the Theory of Architecture" and the most significant projects of members of the association in 1923-1925.

Kunstisms, 1920s, Books

"Kunstism". The book is a montage about the new art published by El Lissitzky together with Hans Arp in 1925.

Cover of the magazine "Journalist", No. 1, 1929

There is a subway!

Page from the magazine "USSR in construction", No. 8, 1935. Author El Lissitzky.

The first ski jump in Moscow. Sparrow Hills

Poster for the exhibition of achievements of the USSR in Germany, 1929

Poster of Kazimir Malevich's lecture in Orenburg

In July 1920, Kazimir Malevich and El Lissitzky, the leaders of UNOVIS, the movement that promoted the new art, arrived in Orenburg. Malevich gives a lecture "The State Society of Criticism and the New Artist (Innovator)". After that, the whole of August, together with Lissitzky (the author of the sketches for the banners of the new Russia), they rest in the koumiss shop near Orenburg.

Cover of the book "Notes of a Poet"

Cover of the book "ZOO or Letters Not About Love"

USSR poster at the international fur exhibition, 1930

El Lissitzky - Topography of Typography. 1920s

Theses formulated by El Lissitzky about typography and visual perception.

1. Words printed on a sheet are perceived by the eyes, not by ear.
2. With the help of ordinary words, concepts are represented, and with the help of letters, concepts can be expressed.
3. Economy of perception - optics instead of phonetics.
4. The design of a book organism with the help of typesetting material, according to the laws of typographical mechanics, must correspond to the forces of compression and stretching of the text.
5. The design of the book organism with the help of cliches implements a new optics. Supernatural reality improves vision.
6. A continuous sequence of pages - a bioscopic book.
7. New book requires new writers. The inkwell and quills are dead.
8. The printed sheet conquers space and time. The printed sheet and the infinity of the book must themselves be overcome.

Artist

Proun 1A, Most I Suggest a name

Abstraction in pink colors

Hit the whites with a red wedge, 1920

Here are two squares, 1920

geometric abstraction

Teachers of the National Art School

Teachers of the National Art School. Vitebsk, July 26, 1919. Seated from left to right: El Lissitzky, Vera Ermolaeva, Marc Chagall, David Yakerson, Yudel Pan, Nina Kogan, Alexander Romm. There is a clerk of the school.

LISITSKY, LAZAR MARKOVICH(1890–1941), also El Lissitzky, Russian painter, architect and art theorist. Born in the village of Pochinok (Smolensk province) on November 10 (22), 1890 in the family of an artisan entrepreneur. His first mentor in art was the Vitebsk painter Yu.M.Pen. After graduating from a real school in Smolensk (1909), he entered the Higher Polytechnic School in Darmstadt, graduating in 1914 with a diploma in engineering and architecture. Returning to Russia after the outbreak of the First World War, in 1915-1916 he worked in the architectural bureau of B.M. Velikovsky and R.I. Klein in Moscow. He joined the Jewish Renaissance movement, participating in the activities of the Circle of Jewish National Aesthetics in Moscow and the Kulturliga in Kyiv (1917–1919). Combining historicism in the spirit of the "World of Art" and elements of cubo-futurism with the ornamental traditions of medieval Torah scrolls, Lissitzky illustrated fairy tales and legends ( Prague legend M. Broderson, goat etc.), published by Kulturliga in Yiddish.

In 1919 he moved to Vitebsk, where he directed the architectural workshop and the workshop of printed graphics at the People's Art School, headed by Chagall. With the arrival in Vitebsk of K.S.Malevich (in the same year) he became a passionate supporter of Suprematism. In 1920 he adopted the artistic name "El Lissitzky". In the Suprematist style, he created the design of city holidays, propaganda posters ( Beat the whites with a red wedge, 1919); his famous series Tale about 2 squares(1920; published in the form of a book in Berlin in 1922) symbolically depicts a world renewal, the heralds of which are black and red squares that arrived from space. In the same years, he painted a large cycle of pictorial and graphic "prouns", abstract projects, which, according to the author, were "transfer stations from painting to architecture" (first published in Moscow in 1921). Lissitzky's experiments in Vitebsk culminated in "figurines" for a new production Victory over the sun, a futuristic opera by A.E. Kruchenykh and M.V. Matyushin (published in Berlin in 1923), conceived by him as a performance with electromechanical puppets.

During his life in Germany and Switzerland (1921-1925), Lissitzky's ideas received a great international response. Lissitzky established creative contacts with the Berlin Dadaists, figures of the Bauhaus and the Dutch group "De Stijl", published together with I.G. Ehrenburg the magazine "Thing" (1923). In the book Mayakovsky. For voice(1923), the master implemented the principles of a new visual-spatial, solved mainly by purely typographic means of book design. Returning to Moscow (1925), he taught at the Vkhutemas (Higher Artistic and Technical Workshops), designed a play by S.M. Tretyakov for V.E. Meyerhold I want a baby(1930), developed a number of innovative architectural designs; summarized his theories about the life-transforming meaning of modern architecture in the book Russia. Architecture for world revolution, published in Berlin in German (1930).

Rigid objectivism in relation to the Soviet social utopia (for all its sincere enthusiasm for the latter) appeared in the best of the exhibition complexes designed by Lissitzky (the Soviet pavilion at the international exhibition "Press" in Cologne, 1928; etc.); The “new world” here looks like a realm of mannequins, a kind of mechanical “figures”, perceived in a detached and ironic way. Squeezed in the grip of increasingly strict censorship, Lissitzky's work loses its former philosophical and ironic expression in the 1930s, although the master retains important positions in official artistic life (in 1932-1940 he was one of the leading designers of the magazine "USSR in Construction" , and since 1935 - the main artist of the All-Union Agricultural Exhibition).

5. ACTIVITIES OF THE AMBASSADOR'S ORDER ON THE ESTABLISHMENT OF DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS BETWEEN THE STATE OF MOSCOW AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES

A. Establishment of diplomatic relations with European countries and regular peaceful (diplomatic or tributary) relations with the countries of the East

Over the entire 150-year history of its activity, the Posolsky Prikaz established relations with 10 new European states and 8 Asian ones, while before the formation of the Posolsky Prikaz, relations were established with 18 countries in just 70 years, that is, in half the period.

If we take into account that out of 10 countries that entered into relations with Russia during the period of the Ambassadorial Prikaz, only 5 can be considered real countries with which the Ambassadorial Prikaz “worked” (since the Order of Malta could not be considered a “country”, and Bavaria, Hanover , Genoa and Sardinia can actually be recorded in the assets of the Ambassadorial Office of Peter I, and not the apparatus of the Ambassadorial Prikaz), it must be admitted that the Ambassadorial Prikaz was almost ... inactive. In Asia, the quantitative results of the activities of the Ambassadorial Order in establishing diplomatic relations with new countries look even more discouraging: if we exclude the puppet semi-states, semi-colonies, which were absorbed by Moscow half a century later, then Persia and Georgia remain, relations with which were maintained extremely irregularly and became permanent only with XVIII century, i.e. outside the chronological framework of the activities of the Ambassadorial order.

These quantitative results of the work of the Ambassadorial Order allow us to draw a conclusion about the nature and direction of the activity of this department. The department, of course, did not sit idle, but worked at full capacity and even, as we know from the documents, with great tension. But the main task of Russian diplomacy was to control and monitor relations with foreign countries, and not to encourage these relations, not to develop and stimulate them. On the contrary, the task was to keep relations with any power within rigid, strictly defined limits. And the observance of these rules was vigilantly monitored by the clerks and the clerk of the Foreign Ministry.

Another important task of Russian diplomacy was the gradual gathering of powers, the tireless acquisition and annexation of new territories to the Russian state. In this matter, Russian diplomats showed exceptional zeal, perseverance and purposefulness, consistency and patience, and often selflessness, that is, the best, brightest state and human qualities. This fact cannot but be noted and emphasized, because the Russian state, Russia as a great power, is a monument to the activity of the diplomats of the Posolsky Prikaz.

For decades, even sometimes half a century, for centuries they have been stubbornly, persistently moving towards their goal, without forcing events in order to prevent any mistake, which has always been considered an unforgivable mistake in Russian diplomacy. Better less, but better, you drive more quietly - you will continue - these are the principles that seriously guided the Ambassadorial Order, never striving for quick, but transient and ephemeral success, for external effects. So, for example, the complete annexation of the tribal states of the Ob region - a task that seemed to be “doomed” to success in advance - nevertheless dragged on for 50 years, but went exceptionally smoothly, without any excesses; the annexation of Georgia (Kakheti, Kartaliniya, Imereti) took more than a century, but it took place in full agreement and unity with the ruling circles and estates of this state, with the consent and approval of the entire Georgian people.

It was in this truly bee, painstaking work to collect and attach new territories to the Russian state that the meaning and historical significance of all the activities of the Posolsky Prikaz as a foreign policy department consisted.

The activities of the Ambassadorial Order in relation to European countries are especially indicative. It is an excellent illustration of the working methods of this institution.

If we carefully look at the above table, we will notice that the establishment of relations with new European countries during the existence of the Ambassadorial Order was always preceded by lengthy, preliminary, “probing” negotiations, often dragging on for years. They talked about whether it is possible and worth recognizing the foreign state that turned to the king with a request to enter into diplomatic relations. Often, such an appeal was generally followed by a sharp rebuke from the Moscow boyars, who declared on behalf of the tsar that it was “unhandy”, unprofitable, unnecessary for our state to enter into relations with someone.

The embassy order found out, checked and rechecked by all means available at that time whether this kingdom-state, which asked to enter into relations with Russia, was solid, and whether “acquaintance” with it would lower the dignity of the Muscovite kingdom and its tsar.

As a result of this captious, strict policy, Moscow established relations with such countries as Great Britain (as it began to be called from the time of the Tudors!), Holland - at that time the possession of Spain under Philip II and Isabella of Spain - that is, with the two largest states Europe of that time, politically strong and economically extremely useful for relations with Russia. As for their political orientation, the reactionary regime of Philip II in Europe (covering Spain, Portugal, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Milan, Belgium and the Netherlands) needs no special "presentation", its historical significance is well known.

With regard to the "small" states - Tuscany and Switzerland - and here the Moscow diplomats showed themselves completely up to par, not making a mistake in choosing friends. Tuscany and Switzerland responded to the principle of "small spool, but expensive." These were the best training centers for highly qualified specialists in Europe at that time. It was from here that the military, engineers, architects, builders, artisans, doctors, scientists, artists, artists were recruited into the Moscow State, used both directly as specialists in their profession and as teachers preparing Russian specialists in the same industry.

At the same time, such countries as Courland, which Moscow diplomats did not consider at all to be a state, because its territory was only equal to two counties (Mitavsky and Goldingensky), and its head was not at all a noble person, but an impoverished grandson of the former Livonian germeister Gotthard Kettler, a longtime enemy of the Russian state, were not at all needed by Russia as "friends", but could become, if they were "caressed", unprofitable freeloaders. And therefore, Moscow diplomats forced Duke Jacob I for 11 whole years to persuade the clerks of the Ambassadorial order to send them valuable gifts and other “commemorations” so that they would only put in a good word about him and his duchy before His Royal Majesty.

So “poor relatives” and other “unprofitable” states that were unnecessary “for business”, but only able to increase the number of foreign counterparties, were sifted out as an empty ballast for Russia’s foreign affairs by the vigilant diplomats of the Ambassadorial Order. They did not pursue the size of the diplomatic corps at all and did not think about expanding the staff of their department, modestly working to maintain relations with three dozen countries, which was quite enough at that time.

The main direction of the work of the Posolsky Prikaz was to prevent the infiltration of various Western “seditions” into Russia, to isolate foreigners in Russia and Russians from foreigners, and also to collect military, political and economic data on the situation in the countries of Europe and Asia.

Only under Peter I, even before the complete liquidation of the Ambassadorial Order, did a change occur in the previous methods of work and in the principles of establishing diplomatic relations with foreign countries. Peter 1 introduced a lot of subjectivism and voluntarism into foreign policy, ignoring the old Russian traditions. He established diplomatic relations with everyone who either asked for it or was personally familiar to him in one way or another. That is why, already in the first years of his reign, he established relations with a mass of petty German monarchs, whom he met during his stay and raids in Western Europe (we don’t even indicate them, because most of these “states” simply disappeared from the political map after Northern war and especially after the Napoleonic wars at the end of the 18th - beginning of the 19th centuries). It is precisely because of these qualities of Peter I that among the “friends” of Russia or countries that have diplomatic relations with it, there was any “rogue” like the decrepit Republic of Genoa, the semi-puppet “kingdom” of Sardinia and Sicily, sandwiched between the Austrian Empire and Prussia, Bavaria or the tiny Order of Malta , relations with which could only tickle the pride of such monarchs as Peter I and his "great-grandson" Paul I. The old clerks of the Ambassadorial Order would not allow establishing relations with such countries. Under the old tsars, for all their supposedly slavish subordination to the will of the sovereign, they (i.e., the apparatus of the Posolsky Prikaz) possessed the ability to force the monarch to make only those decisions that were traditional for Russian diplomacy, and had the full opportunity, with facts in hand, to prove all the disadvantages recognition of the country that was not needed, useless or even harmful to Russia.

Peter the Great broke this tried and tested, faultless, albeit terribly routine, slowly operating machine. During his lifetime, he removed professional diplomats from decision-making in foreign affairs. But this practice did not last long - only a quarter of a century.

The Collegium of Foreign Affairs, which replaced the Ambassadorial Order soon after the death of Peter I, turned, as we will see below, into a body with sovereign power planning, building and deciding in principle all foreign policy affairs, not at all taking into account the weak-willed German monarchs on the Russian throne. Moreover, all the affairs of the Collegium were decided not at all collectively, but absolutely single-handedly by the most powerful and strongest person in this Collegium - its head or his deputy. And he was guided solely by the historical interests of Russia, although it also happened that along the way, but without violating state interests, this or that chancellor also decided his personal affairs (for example, A. I. Osterman, A. P., Bestuzhev-Ryumin, N. I. Panin).