David Davidovich Burliuk

The collection of the artist (briefly owned by Vladimir Mayakovsky in 1925)
Thence by descent

New York, Art Center, Benefit Exhibition and Sale of Paintings by David Burliuk for the Earthquake Sufferers of Japan, September 1923, no.92, possibly
Munich, Stadtische Galerie and Lenback Galerie, Futuristen, November 1959, no.2
London, Grosvenor Gallery, David Burliuk Paintings 1907-1966, London, March-April 1966, no.15

Benefit Exhibition and Sale of Paintings by David Burliuk for the Earthquake Sufferers of Japan, New York, 1923, no.92, possibly
M.Burliuk, Color and Rhyme, no.43, Hampton Bays, New York, 1959, p.2, illustrated
M.Burliuk, Color and Rhyme, no.48, Hampton Bays, New York, 1961-1962, p.15, illustrated
Grosvenor Gallery exhibition catalogue, David Burliuk Paintings 1907-1966, London, 1966, no.15
Russian Futurism and David Burliuk, St. Petersburg, The State Russian Museum, 2000, p.172, illustrated

Original canvas, which is slightly uneven in the upper section. There is a small impact dent to the 5th and 6th arm repetition of the right arm of the worker. There are minor lines of craquelure. There is a small spot of turquoise pigment on one of the arms, but this appears to be original. UV light reveals spots of retouching. Held in a black painted wooden frame. Unexamined out of frame.
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Planting Rice is an exceptional example of Burliuk’s forays into Cubo-Futurism, a movement based on fusing Cubist-inspired planes and displacement with a sense of rhythm and motion. Burliuk himself founded the uniquely Russian Cubo-Futurist movement in 1920, expanding upon the Italian-born Futurist movement  introduced in 1909 by Filippo Marinetti which called for a radical upheaval in the arts and complete rejection of tradition.

Like many of his contemporaries, David Burliuk left Russia soon after the Revolution, but instead of travelling to Europe or the United States, he emigrated to Japan via Siberia in 1920. His reputation as the “Father of Futurism” preceded him, and he was embraced instantly by Japanese society. They were excited to have this eccentric celebrity in their midst. Burliuk soon became well-known all over Japan, and he organized exhibitions in Kobe, Tokyo and Yokohama, and gave lectures on Cubo-Futurism and writing poetry. 

Planting Rice showcases the influence of Japanese culture on his work. A woman harvesting rice is a subject that would typically be found in folk painting and is an emblematic figure of everyday life within Japanese culture. This choice of the 'common man' as subject can be found throughout Burliuk’s oeuvre (fig.3). 'Yes, Burliuk is a folk painter fundamentally. His native ability glows very bright whenever he touches any subject related to the soil' (Herman Baron, ACA Gallery exhibition catalogue, New York, 1948). Burliuk’s dedication to the common people, no matter where he travelled, remained a priority throughout his career.

The traditional subject matter is at odds with the avant-garde, Cubo-Futurist elements of the work. The harvester’s form is born from juxtaposing lines and the planes created by these lines; she is part of the landscape. Fragmented and interrupted planes of colour create a multi-dimensional image of Cubist influences. Burliuk’s signature technique is the use of repetition to depict the woman’s legs and arms, creating the feeling of dynamic and powerful motion, as well as referencing the repetitive nature of the task itself. This technique is central to Futurism (fig.5), and can be seen in many of Burliuk’s other Cubo-Futurist paintings (figs.2 and 4). 'On account of the persistency of an image upon the retina, moving objects constantly multiply themselves; their form changes like rapid vibrations, in their mad career. Thus a running horse has not found legs, but twenty, and their movements are triangular' (Umberto Boccioni et al, Futurist Painting: Technical Manifesto, 1910).

Burliuk was frequently at odds with the Italian futurists led by Marinetti, and as early as 1912 attempted to organise his fellow artists into a rival group. Among those who responded was the poet Vladimir Mayakovsky and out of the collaboration came the infamous manifesto of the Russian futurists: A Slap in the Face of Public Taste. When Marinetti came to Moscow in 1914, Burliuk and Mayakovsky’s rival group (fig.1) responded by organising a tour of Futurist evenings in the south of Russia and declaring to the press: ‘we witnessed from afar the tragi-comic conquest of Moscow by Mr Marinetti… we had nothing to do with Italian Futurism’ (J.Milner, A Slap in the Face! Futurists in Russia, London: Estorick collection, 2007, p.31). Although they shared the same anarchic spirit, the Russian Futurists did not worship the machine and the mechanical movement which were the lynchpins of the Italian movement (fig.6). Marinetti himself recognised this, declaring: ‘To the Russian soul I send a plea for the recovery of Russian Futurism [calling it] not Futurism but Savage-ism and its followers not Futurists but Savage-ists, Primitivists’ (ibid.). Planting Rice compellingly illustrates this, eschewing the machine aesthetic of the Italian futurists for a vision of the worker in motion, at one with the soil.

According to Color and Rhyme, Marussia and David Burliuk’s serial publication featuring paintings, poetry, and musings on the goings on in the art world, Planting Rice was in the collection of the Futurist poet Vladimir Mayakovsky in 1925 (fig.7).  It has remained in the same private collection until now, and is certainly one of the strongest works by the artist to ever come up for auction.