578 - Alexander Rodtschenko* (St. Petersburg 1891 - 1956 Moscow)

Alexander Rodtschenko* (St. Petersburg 1891 - 1956 Moscow) Student, 1930 gelatin silver print 39,9 x 26,6 cm later print from 1989 under the supervision of Grigory Chudakov (former editor-in-chief of Sovetskoe Foto) SCHÄTZPREIS / ESTIMATE € 700 - 1800 STARTPREIS / STARTING PRICE € 700 Alexander Mikhailovich Rodchenko (1891–1956) was one of the most significant figures of the Russian avant-garde and a founder of Constructivism. Starting out with abstract painting and spatial constructions, he increasingly turned his attention to photomontage, graphic design, typography, industrial design, and photography from the early 1920s onwards. In 1921, he declared traditional painting to be at an end, viewing art instead as the productive shaping of modern everyday life. His photographs revolutionized visual perception through extreme high- and low-angle shots, diagonal perspectives, radical cropping, and unusual spatial compositions. Rodchenko collaborated with Varvara Stepanova on numerous Russian avant-garde projects; his photographs and photomontages appeared in publications such as LEF and Novy LEF, combining experimental visual language with the social and technical ideals of Productivism. Rodchenko’s work engaged in a close dialogue with that of El Lissitzky, Wassily Kandinsky, László Moholy-Nagy, Gustav Klutsis, Lyubov Popova, and Varvara Stepanova, situating itself within the international network of Constructivism, the Bauhaus, and the "New Vision" (Neues Sehen). He was connected to El Lissitzky through the First Russian Art Exhibition held in Berlin in 1922; meanwhile, Moholy-Nagy maintained a direct exchange with Rodchenko, inviting him in 1923 to write a text on Constructivism for the Bauhaus. His photographic practice—incorporating photomontage, collage, radical perspectives, and a geometric conception of space—became a crucial starting point for the experimental photography and "New Vision" aesthetic of the 1920s. Furthermore, Rodchenko’s spatial constructions and his reduction of forms to geometric essentials exerted an influence far beyond the Russian avant-garde, later becoming relevant to the development of minimalist art. PLEASE NOTE: The purchase price consists of the highest bid plus the buyer's premium, sales tax and, if applicable, the fee of artists resale rights and platform fee. In the case of normal taxation (marked ° at the estimate), a premium of 24% is added to the highest bid. The mandatory sales tax is added to the sum of the highest bid, the buyer's premium and platform fee. This amounts to 13% for paintings, drawings, graphic works and sculptures and 20% for photographs and all other items. The buyer's premium amounts to 28% in case of differential taxation. The sales tax is included in the differential taxation.