Symposium to focus on "Rethinking Malevich" (02/01/04)

Symposium to focus on "Rethinking Malevich"

NEW YORK - The Malevich Society has announced a two-day conference devoted to the theme of "Rethinking Malevich" in celebration of the 125th anniversary of Kazimir Malevich's birth (1878-1935). The conference will be held Friday and Saturday, February 6-7, in the Elebash Recital Hall of The Graduate School and University Center of the City University of New York, located at 365 Fifth Ave. at 34th Street.

Art historians, students, artists, art collectors as well as the general public are invited to attend. The conference will feature presentations by an international group of scholars and researchers from Russia, the United States, the Netherlands, and New Zealand. The speakers will present original research and discuss Malevich's writings and works of art, and interpret them in relation to other artists and to subsequent artistic movements.

The two-day conference program will feature the following speakers on February 6: John Bowlt, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, "Kazimir Malevich and Fedor Rerberg"; Irina Vakar, State Tretiakov Gallery, Moscow, "Kazimir Malevich and Ortega y Gasset on the New Art"; Elena Basner, independent scholar, St. Petersburg, "The Early Work of Malevich and Kandinsky: A Comparative Analysis;" Natalia Avtonomova, Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow, "Malevich and Kandinsky: The Choices after Non-Objectivity"; Tatiana Goriacheva, State Tretiakov Gallery, Moscow, "Suprematism and Constructivism: The Intersection of Parallels"; Linda Boersma, University of Utrecht, the Netherlands, "Malevich and 'The Style' (De Stijl)."

Appearing on February 7 will be: Pamela Kachurin, Davis Center, Harvard University, "Malevich as Soviet Bureaucrat: GINKhUK and the Survival of the Avant-Garde, 1923-1926"; Konstantin Akinsha, independent scholar, Washington, "The Funeral of the Revolution"; Eva Forgacs, Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, Calif., "Malevich and Western Modernism"; James Lawrence, University of Texas at Austin, "False Positives: Malevich, MoMa and Minimalism"; Irina Karasik, art historian, St. Petersburg, "Extending Malevich: Malevich as a Subject in Russian Art after World War II"; and, Aleksandra Shatskikh, independent scholar, Moscow, "Features of Kazimir Malevich's Literary Legacy: A Summary."

Malevich will be considered in a Ukrainian context by two presenters on February 6: Prof. Myroslava M. Mudrak of Ohio State University in Columbus, and Prof. Adrian Barr of Massey University in Wellington, New Zealand.

Prof. Mudrak's presentation, titled "Malevich and His Ukrainian Contemporaries," will offer an analysis of the Ukrainian context that may have informed three separate formative periods of Malevich's art. As noted in the presentation abstract, consideration is given to Malevich's first teacher, Mykola Pymonenko, who "explored Impressionism in the refracted light of Ukrainian village settings"; the work of Kyiv Cubo-Futurist, Oleksander Bohomazov, "whose pedagogic theories filtered into Malevich's teaching at the Kyiv Institute of Art, [acting as a parallel] to Malevich's search for essentialized form"; and , Mykhailo Boichuk, Malevich's fellow teacher at the Kyiv Institute of Art, whose revival of "statuesque Byzantine figuration in the depiction of peasants during the years of collectivization ... resonated in the last period of Malevich's art."

In his presentation, titled "From 'Vozbuzhdenie' to 'Oshchushchenie': Theoretical Shifts, 'Nova Generatsiia' and the Late Paintings," Prof. Barr will address the series of articles Malevich wrote for the Kharkiv journal "Nova Generatsiia" (New Generation) between 1928 and 1930, proposing that they represent a substantial shift from Malevich's theorizing of 1915 on non-objective art, as further corroborated by the artist's late paintings. ["Nova Generatsiya" was the official journal of the eponymous literary organization founded in 1927 by former members of the Association of Panfuturists, devoted to current literary polemics and literary and art currents. It was published in Kharkiv under the editorship of Mykhailo Semenko.]

Conference presenters were selected by the president of the Malevich Society, Charlotte Douglas, and the vice-presidents, Vivian Barnett and Christina Lodder, from a large number of applicants.

The Malevich Society, a private American not-for-profit organization, is based in New York and was founded in 2001 by the heirs of the artist. As noted in its press release, the society is dedicated to advancing knowledge "about the Russian artist Malevich" and his work. In the belief that Malevich was a pioneer of modern art and should be better recognized for his key contributions to the history of Modernism, the society awards grants to encourage research, writing, and other activities relating to the history and memory of Kazimir Malevich. To this end, the society has awarded grants in 2002 and 2003 to scholars and students who have submitted proposals for research and publications.

The preliminary conference program and abstracts of the presentations are available on the Malevich Society's website at www.malevichsociety.org. Advance conference registration may be made by mail to the Malevich Society in care of Herrick Feinstein LLP, 2 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10016. The fee for the two-day conference is $20; $10 for students. Tickets will also be available at the door of the conference on February 6 and 7.

For further information, call (718) 980-1805 or consult the society's website, www.malevichsociety.org.

| Home Page |