Lot 9
  • 9

Lazar Markovich Khidekel

Estimate
12,000 - 18,000 GBP
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Description

  • Lazar Markovich Khidekel
  • Philosophy of the Circle: Mass, Density and Movement
  • ink on paper
  • diameter: 21cm, 8 1/4 in.
  • Executed in 1921

Provenance

Family of the artist, St Petersburg
Leonard Hutton Galleries, New York
Acquired from the above

Exhibited

New York, Leonard Hutton Galleries, Lazar Markovich Khidekel - Suprematism and Architecture, 15 February - 31 March 1995, no.35

Literature

Exhibition catalogue Lazar Markovich Khidekel - Suprematism and Architecture, New York: Leonard Hutton Galleries, 1995, no.35 illustrated and listed
A.Shatskikh, Vitebsk: The Life of Art, New Haven, London: Yale University Press, 2007, p.196, no.163 illustrated b/w; p.184 detail
R.Khidekel (ed.), Lazar Khidekel and Suprematism, London: Prestel, 2014, p.21, no.10 illustrated

Condition

The sheet is hinged to the mount at the top edge. It has discoloured slightly and the edge is uneven in places. A few diagonal creases are visible in the lower right and above the centre of the composition, other minor creasing is present in places. There is a small repaired tear to the upper left of the centre and an even smaller one in the lower left edge. In the very centre of the composition is a pinhole and there are other smaller pinholes scattered around the edge. On the reverse of the backing board is a label from the Leonard Hutton exhibition. Held behind glass in a painted wooden frame. Unexamined out of frame.
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Catalogue Note

Lazar Khidekel was one of Kazimir Malevich’s core disciples at UNOVIS at the Vitebsk art school. He is best known for his work on volumetric Suprematism and its application to architectural projects, formulating radical ideas for city planning and even the urbanisation of the Cosmos.

It is possible that this design is a suprema, an UNOVIS term for a decorative circular object or tondo. The circle is essential to Suprematist theory because, as Malevich explained in his Suprematist manifesto of 1927 The Non-Objective World, the circle is ‘the first shape originating from the square’ and the square is ‘the fundamental Suprematist element’. The hole in the centre of the sheet suggests that the finished object, possibly of painted enamel, was intended to be spun on a dowel. Once in motion the carefully spaced black patterns would create a visual effect. This idea was later picked up by the Swiss artist Jean Tinguely in his spinning sculptures of objets trouvés from the 1950s, entitled Meta-Malevich.