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THBALEXANDER ZHITOMIRSKIY (RUSSIAN 1907-1993)
Lot 187
About Seller
Shapiro Auctions
566 East Boston Post Road
Mamaroneck, NY 10543
United States
Our auctions feature an impressive selection of fine art, decorative art, rare books, icons, militaria, and other objects from antiquity to the present. Shapiro Auctions advertises globally and has clients all over the world, while providing a rare combination of personal service and the ability to ...Read more
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Live Auction in Progress ... Currently on Lot Estimate:
$5,000 - $7,000
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About Auction
Live
By Shapiro Auctions
May 21, 2016 - May 22, 2016
Set Reminder
2016-05-21 10:00:00
2016-05-22 10:00:00
America/New_York
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Bidsquare : Fine & Decorative Art and Antiques Auction
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View Full Catalog (474)
- Lot Description
ALEXANDER ZHITOMIRSKIY (RUSSIAN 1907-1993)
Nicaragua: Sun from the Fire, 1986
double-sided gelatin silver photo-collage mounted on an album page
19 x 13 cm (7 1/2 x 5 1/2 in.)
PROVENANCE
Acquired from the family of the artist by the present owner
LOT NOTES
The present lot is a photo collage maquette for a book cover by A. Serikov, published by the Soviet Russia Publishing House
LOT NOTES:
Alexander Zhitomirsky was born on January 11, 1907, in Rostov-on-Don, Russia. At the age of eighteen, he moved to Moscow, where he studied with Ilya Mashkov and Vladimir Favorsky at the Association of Artists of Revolutionary Russia. In 1930, after several years of working as an illustrator for magazines and creating posters, Zhitomirsky started working as a caricaturist for Rabochaya Gazeta [The Workers` Newspaper]. Eventually he became the art director of both Industria Sotsializma [Socialist Industry] and Illustrirovannaya Gazeta [Illustrated Newspaper]. During the 1930s, Zhitomirsky produced personal collages and albums dedicated to his wife, Erika, despite the fact that Stalinist censorship in this period was at its peak and personal language and creativity was strictly forbidden. During WWII, he designed and illustrated publications for the front, including Front Illustrierte, a magazine specifically targeted at German soldiers and dropped from airplanes over enemy lines. From 1950 until 1992, Zhitomirsky worked as the head art director of the magazine Soviet Union, and throughout the Cold War produced powerful propaganda photomontages on peace, disarmament, capitalism, government leaders, and other themes dear to the Soviet regime. In 1957, he met and became close friends with German artist John Heartfield in Moscow. In 1967, he was named an Honorary Artist of the Russian Federation, and in 1978 he received the title of People`s Artist of Russia. Alexander Zhitomirsky died in Moscow in 1993.
Zhitomirsky`s work is considered pivotal in the development of the art of the political photomontage. Today, he is recognized as one of the greatest masters of the genre, alongside Alexander Rodchenko, El Lissitzky, Gustav Klutsis, and the German artist John Heartfield. Furthermore, as Konstantin Akinsha, art historian and critic, observes in his essay Alexander Zhitomirksy, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man: In Zhitomirsky`s case, photomontage was not just `the most progressive` way to design a book cover or a poster, but his own everyday language of intimate communication. - Buyer's Premium
