Vladimir Tatlin
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Vladimir Yevgrafovich Tatlin ( – 31 May 1953) was a Russian and
Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...
painter, architect and stage-designer. Tatlin achieved fame as the architect who designed
The Monument to the Third International Tatlinʼs Tower, or the project for the Monument to the Third International (1919–20), Honour, H. and Fleming, J. (2009) ''A World History of Art''. 7th edn. London: Laurence King Publishing, p. 819. was a design for a grand monumental buildin ...
, more commonly known as Tatlin's Tower, which he began in 1919. Honour, H. and Fleming, J. (2009) ''A World History of Art''. 7th edn. London: Laurence King Publishing, p. 819. With Kazimir Malevich he was one of the two most important figures in the Soviet avant-garde art movement of the 1920s, and he later became an important artist in the Constructivist movement.


Biography

Vladimir Yevgrafovich Tatlin was born in
Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 millio ...
,
Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...
. His father, Yevgraf Nikoforovich Tatlin was a hereditary nobleman from Oryol, a mechanical engineer graduated from the Technological Institute in St.Petersburg and employed by the Moscow-Brest Railway in Moscow. His mother, Nadezhda Nikolaevna Tatlina (Bart) was a poet who sympathized with the
Narodnaya Volya Narodnaya Volya ( rus, Наро́дная во́ля, p=nɐˈrodnəjə ˈvolʲə, t=People's Will) was a late 19th-century revolutionary political organization in the Russian Empire which conducted assassinations of government officials in an att ...
revolutionary movement. After she died in 1887, his father married again and resettled to Kharkiv. His father, by whom he lived after having failed to study in
Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture The Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture (russian: Московское училище живописи, ваяния и зодчества, МУЖВЗ) also known by the acronym MUZHZV, was one of the largest educational insti ...
died in 1904, so young Vladimir had to interrupt his studies at the Kharkov Arts School and to leave for Odessa to become a merchant sea cadet. According to his own memories, sea and distant lands gave him both means of subsistence and source of inspiration; he sailed all across the
Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal mediterranean sea of the Atlantic Ocean lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bounded by Bulgaria, Georgia, Rom ...
and also to
Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...
. In 1905 he started and in 1910 successfully completed his studies at N.Selivestrov Penza Art School in
Penza Penza ( rus, Пе́нза, p=ˈpʲɛnzə) is the largest city and administrative center of Penza Oblast, Russia. It is located on the Sura River, southeast of Moscow. As of the 2010 Census, Penza had a population of 517,311, making it the 38th-la ...
. During the summer vacations he traveled to Moscow and St.Petersburg to participate in various art events. In 1911 he resettled to Moscow to live by his uncle and began his art career as an icon painter. He also sang in Ukrainian and was a professional musician-
bandurist A banduryst ( uk, бандури́ст) is a person who plays the Ukrainian plucked string instrument known as the bandura. Types of performers There are a number of different types of bandurist who differ in their particular choice of instrumen ...
, and performed as such abroad. Tatlin became familiar with the work of Pablo Picasso during a trip to Paris in 1913. Tatlin achieved fame as the architect who designed the huge Monument to the
Third International The Communist International (Comintern), also known as the Third International, was a Soviet-controlled international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism. The Comintern resolved at its Second Congress to "struggle by a ...
, also known as
Tatlin's Tower Tatlinʼs Tower, or the project for the Monument to the Third International (1919–20), Honour, H. and Fleming, J. (2009) ''A World History of Art''. 7th edn. London: Laurence King Publishing, p. 819. was a design for a grand monumental buildin ...
. Tatlin began to design it in 1919. The monument was to be a tall tower made of
iron Iron () is a chemical element with Symbol (chemistry), symbol Fe (from la, Wikt:ferrum, ferrum) and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 element, group 8 of the periodic table. It is, Abundanc ...
, glass and steel which would have dwarfed the
Eiffel Tower The Eiffel Tower ( ; french: links=yes, tour Eiffel ) is a wrought-iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the tower. Locally nicknamed "' ...
in
Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...
(the Monument to the Third International was a third taller at 400 meters high). Inside the iron-and-steel structure of twin spirals, the design envisaged three building blocks, covered with glass windows, which would rotate at different speeds (the first one, a cube, once a year; the second one, a pyramid, once a month; the third one, a cylinder, once a day). The entire building was to house the executive and
legislature A legislature is an assembly with the authority to make law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its p ...
of the Comintern, and be a central area for the creation and dissemination of propaganda. For financial and practical reasons, however, the tower was never built. Janson, H.W. (1995) ''History of Art''. 5th edn. Revised and expanded by Anthony F. Janson. London: Thames & Hudson, p. 820. Singh, Iona (2012) ''Aesthetic World in the Future - chapter from Color, Facture, Art & Design''. Hampshire:
Zero Books John Hunt Publishing is a left-wing publishing company founded in the United Kingdom in 2001, initially named O Books. The publisher has 24 active autonomous imprints, with the largest of these being the Zero Books imprint (styled Zer0 Books) fou ...
, p. 104-128.
Tatlin was also regarded as a progenitor of Soviet post-Revolutionary Constructivist art with his pre-Revolutionary counter-reliefs, three-dimensional constructions made of wood and metal, some placed in corners (corner counter-reliefs) and others more conventionally. Tatlin conceived these
sculpture Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable ...
s in order to question the traditional ideas of art, though he did not regard himself as a Constructivist and objected to many of the movement's ideas. Later prominent constructivists included
Varvara Stepanova Varvara Fyodorovna Stepanova (russian: Варва́ра Фёдоровна Степа́нова; – May 20, 1958) was a Russian artist. With her husband Alexander Rodchenko, she was associated with the Constructivist branch of the Russian avant ...
,
Alexander Rodchenko Aleksander Mikhailovich Rodchenko (russian: link=no, Алекса́ндр Миха́йлович Ро́дченко; – 3 December 1956) was a Russian and Soviet artist, sculptor, photographer, and graphic designer. He was one of the founders ...
, Manuel Rendón Seminario,
Joaquín Torres García Joaquín or Joaquin is a male given name, the Spanish version of Joachim. Given name * Joaquín (footballer, born 1956), Spanish football midfielder * Joaquín (footballer, born 1981), Spanish football winger * Joaquín (footballer, born 19 ...
,
László Moholy-Nagy László Moholy-Nagy (; ; born László Weisz; July 20, 1895 – November 24, 1946) was a Hungarian painter and photographer as well as a professor in the Bauhaus school. He was highly influenced by constructivism and a strong advocate of the ...
,
Antoine Pevsner Antoine Pevsner (12 April 1962) was a Russian-born sculptor and the older brother of Alexii Pevsner and Naum Gabo. Both Antoine and Naum are considered pioneers of twentieth-century sculpture. Biography Pevsner was born as Natan Borisovich P ...
and
Naum Gabo Naum Gabo, born Naum Neemia Pevsner (23 August 1977) (Hebrew: נחום נחמיה פבזנר), was an influential sculptor, theorist, and key figure in Russia's post-Revolution avant-garde and the subsequent development of twentieth-century scul ...
. Although colleagues at the beginning of their careers, Tatlin and Malevich quarrelled fiercely and publicly at the time of the 0.10 Exhibition in 1915 (long before the birth of Constructivism), also called "the last futurist exhibition", apparently over the '
suprematist Suprematism (russian: Супремати́зм) is an early twentieth-century art movement focused on the fundamentals of geometry (circles, squares, rectangles), painted in a limited range of colors. The term ''suprematism'' refers to an abstra ...
' works Malevich exhibited there. This led Malevich to develop his ideas further in the city of
Vitebsk Vitebsk or Viciebsk (russian: Витебск, ; be, Ві́цебск, ; , ''Vitebsk'', lt, Vitebskas, pl, Witebsk), is a city in Belarus. The capital of the Vitebsk Region, it has 366,299 inhabitants, making it the country's fourth-largest c ...
, where he found a school called
UNOVIS UNOVIS (also known as MOLPOSNOVIS and POSNOVIS) was a short-lived but influential group of artists, founded and led by Kazimir Malevich at the Vitebsk Art School in 1919. Initially formed by students and known as MOLPOSNOVIS, the group formed ...
(Champions of the new art). Tatlin also dedicated himself to the study of clothes, and various objects, and flight, culminating in the construction of Letatlin personal flying apparatus. In the year of 1930 he taught in Kyiv where one of his students was Joseph Karakis. From the 1930s Tatlin worked for different theatres in Moscow and during the
Great Patriotic War The Eastern Front of World War II was a theatre of conflict between the European Axis powers against the Soviet Union (USSR), Poland and other Allies, which encompassed Central Europe, Eastern Europe, Northeast Europe (Baltics), and Sou ...
, in Gorkiy. He also worked for and with many Soviet art organizations, including the department of Fine Arts (IZO) of
Narkompros The People's Commissariat for Education (or Narkompros; russian: Народный комиссариат просвещения, Наркомпрос, directly translated as the "People's Commissariat for Enlightenment") was the Soviet agency charg ...
. In 1948 he was heavily criticized for his allegedly anti-communist stance and lost his job, but was not repressed. Tatlin died in 1953 in Moscow and was buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery.


Gallery of works

File:Female Model by Vladimir Tatlin 1913.jpg, Tatlin, 1913, ''Female Model / Натурщица'', oil on canvas File:A Life for the Tsar (Tatlin) 05.jpg, Tatlin 1913, ''scene design'' for the play 'A Life for the Tsar' File:Counter-relief by V.Tatlin (1916, GTG) 02 by shakko.JPG, Tatlin, 1916, ''Counter-relief'', sculpture of several materials File:Tatlin's Tower maket 1919 year.jpg, Tatlin, 1919–20, ''
Tatlin's Tower Tatlinʼs Tower, or the project for the Monument to the Third International (1919–20), Honour, H. and Fleming, J. (2009) ''A World History of Art''. 7th edn. London: Laurence King Publishing, p. 819. was a design for a grand monumental buildin ...
'', official title: ''Monument to the Third International'', the design was never built File:Tatlin 2.jpg, Tatlin, 1919–20, recently made copy of ''Tatlin's tower, Monument to the Third International'', a later model File:Vladimir Tatlin's dress design.jpg, Tatlin, 1920s, ''dress-design'' File:2012-01 Neue Tretjakow-Galerie 08 anagoria.JPG, Tatlin, 1923–24, ''Costumes'' File:Stockholm Moderna Museet Collection Vladimir Tatlin Letatlin, 1930-32 (5200746581).jpg, Tatlin, 1929-1931: ''Letatlin № 1.'', sculpture; human-powered ornithopter File:Letatlin No 3 at Central Air Force Museum.JPG, Tatlin, 1930–1932, ''Letatlin № 3.'', sculpture; human-powered ornithopter File:Tyrsa Window Cleaner and Portrait of V. Tatlin.jpg, Tatlin, c. 1942, ''Window Cleaner and Portrait of V.'', brush on paper


Notes


References

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External links

*
Tatlin Playing The Bandura. Special Project of the Library of Ukrainian Art.

Exhibition of Russian-Soviet artist Vladimir Tatlin in Basel — Tatlin’s “new art for a new world”

Photographs of Tatlin and his assistants constructing the first model for the monument to the Third International, Petrograd, 1920
Canadian Centre for Architecture The Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA; french: Centre Canadien d'Architecture) is a museum of architecture and research centre in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is located at 1920, rue Baile (1920, Baile Street), between rue Fort (Fort Street ...

digitized items
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tatlin, Vladimir 1885 births 1953 deaths Artists from Moscow People from Moscow Governorate Russian avant-garde Architects from Moscow Constructivist architects Russian painters Russian male painters Russian sculptors Ukrainian sculptors Ukrainian male sculptors Bandurists Soviet architects Soviet painters Constructivism (art) 20th-century Russian male artists Burials at Novodevichy Cemetery 20th-century Russian painters Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture alumni Ukrainian avant-garde