Avant-Garde – Abstraction in Constructivism
Vladimir Tatlin's 'The Monument to the Third International'
Aug 13, 2009
Realism, the first avant-garde movement whose leading figure was Gustave Courbet appeared in the 19th century. Realism reflected the disillusionment of the French people with the results of the French Revolution of 1789 and called for social change. In a similar way, the October Revolution generated a response to the profound social changes in the form of the Russian avant-garde.
Soviet Constructivism
In the years following the Revolution, the Russian avant-garde became the Soviet avant-garde and art itself became a powerful tool of the state ideology. Creating art became incorporated within the plans to build the new socialist society. The concepts of constructing and engineering, experimenting and collective production were applied to the process of creating art. From this perspective, Tatlin's tower might be seen as a scientific experiment.
The Monument to the Third International
Vladimir Tatlin designed the monumental tower 'The Monument to the Third International' in the 1920s. The plan for the tower was conceived in the aftermath of the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 which aimed at establishing of a new socialist order led by The Communist Party with the working class as its leading power.
The giant monumental structure was to be a totally non-representational object made of iron, steel and glass in the form of twin spirals. Its three key dynamic components: cube, pyramid and cylinder were to rotate at different speeds.
Industrial Aesthetic
The Soviet Constructivism emerged as a response to the changes in society and advance in technology and Tatlin's sculptural design reflects this in the use of modern industrial materials and the in the method of construction. Tatlin's artistic treatment rejects the contemporary modes of representation.
Tatlin's project indicates that he set out to explore the properties of modern industrial materials and their interaction with the three-dimensional space, not with the two-dimensional illusionistic pictorial space. Indeed, the structure's aesthetic and its dynamic elements are inspired by industrial machinery.
Abstraction in Constructivism
The structural dynamism of Tatlin's tower reflects the enthusiasm of the Soviet urban proletariat to build a new socialist society. The ideal artist was someone who actively participated in the building of the new order, a constructor.The role of Russian abstract art was to participate in this process. Therefore, the principles of construction and enineering became appropriate forms for the contemporary Soviet artists.
The use of the latest technologies and materials refer to everyday realities of what was seen to be progressive society. Tatlin's monument thus indicates references to both, the aesthetic purity of art and utalitarian nature of the materials and techniques used. Tatlin thus embraced in his work certain aspects of urban modernity and modernism as well as the vision of socio-political change pioneered by the French thinker Henri de Saint-Simon who applied the avant-gardist concept to art.
Art in the New Socialist Order
Tatlin's radicalism did share in the original Saint-Simonian idea of politically engaged art able to ensure social progress, and like Gustave Courbet, he was a politically concerned artist. However, while the aim of Courbet's Realism of the 19th century was to challenge the ruling power and generate a change of social order, Tatlin's art served as an instrument for generating support for the existing system and propagandizing the new state ideology.
The Monument to the Third International was to represent a symbol of modernity but was never realized as it turned out to be technically and financially impossible.
Source:
- Wood, Paul: The Challenge of the Avant-Garde, Yale University Press
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