Choice Review
It is as difficult to do justice to this enormous volume in a brief review as it is to pick it up with one hand. It contains 21 scholarly articles, 733 color reproductions, as well as numerous black and white illustrations. Only the unprecedented cooperation between American and Soviet museums in the glasnost era made the exhibit and the catalog possible. The articles have the particular merit of dealing with institutions, such as Unovis, Malevich's art school in Vitebsk, and Vkhutemas, the "Higher Artistic Workshops," in which both Kandinsky and Malevich participated, rather than with individual artists. However, the catalog includes so many paintings that it also offers a chance to reevaluate some artists. The publication of this book, together with other important recent works on 20th-century Russian art, such as M. Culherne Bowns's Art Under Stalin (1991) and R. Crone and D. Moos's Kazimir Malevich: The Climax of Disclosure (CH, Apr'92), creates the necessary critical mass for beginning to understand modern Russian art in all its complexity. J. M. Curtis; University of MissouriDSColumbia
Library Journal Review
Though overshadowed by the publicity surrounding 1992's massive Henri Matisse retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum exhibition cataloged here is equally deserving of attention. With reproductions of over 700 works of art representing a dramatic expansion in the study of Russian and Soviet Modernism, this commemoration-on-a-grand-scale goes well beyond a mere rehashing of the Suprematist wedges and squares painted by Kazimir Malevich. Leaving no art historical stone unturned, this book demonstrates how thoroughly this aesthetic revolution placed all varieties of artistic expression in the service of social goals. Among the many fascinating examples here are the manifestations of the era's Constructivist/Suprematist sensibilities within more proletarian media such as costume, book, porcelain, and textile design. Groupings of excellent reproductions separate the scholarly and theoretical essays. Clearly the definitive work on modern Russian and Soviet art, this is highly recommended for all art collections.-- Douglas F. Smith, Oakland P.L., Cal. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
