Head-First Through the Hole in the Zero: Malevich’s Suprematism, Khlebnikov’s Futurism, and the Development of a Deconstructive Aesthetic, 1908–1919 (original) (raw)

Electronic Melbourne Art Journal

Suprematism's attempt to move beyond representation in painting coincided with an attempt to move beyond Russian Futurist poetry and literature. It was an attempt to go 'beyond zero'. In making that move, however, Kasimir Malevich, creator of suprematism, needed to develop from Russian Futurism-particularly that of Velimir Khlebnikov-working within the Russian avant-garde. Through his painterly reliance on the square, Malevich not only worked in concert with Futurists such as Khlebnikov but ultimately elaborated on a literary theory bound by the constraints of language. In essence, Malevich's Suprematism could not get 'beyond zero' until Khlebnikov's Futurism got him there. Inception At birth, there is nothing: a mind devoid of representational imagery. But children grow. Imagery mounts. Kasimir Malevich's project throughout the majority of his artistic life was to re-find that original purity. 'I have transformed myself in the zero of form', wrote the artist in 1915, 'and through zero have reached creation, that is, suprematism, the new painterly realism-nonobjective creation'. 1 Malevich's transformation-his ideological development-depended on contact with the Russian avant-garde and, specifically, the Russian Futurist poets of the early twentieth century. That dependence demonstrated the benefit of interdisciplinary collusion. 'I think that first of all art is that not everyone can understand a thing in depths', wrote Malevich in 1913, 'this is left only to the black sheep of time'. 2 Through his consistent painterly reliance on the square, Malevich not only worked in concert with the Futurist poets, but ultimately elaborated on a literary theory bound by the constraints of language. The Russian avant-garde community congealed into a recognizable entity between 1907 and 1908, and the distinct presence of Futurism emerged approximately two years later, including the poets Velimir Khlebnikov and Alexei Kruchenykh, as well as Vladimir Mayakovsky, Olga Rozanova, and the brothers David, Nikolai, and Vladimir Burliuk, among others. 3 Rozanova, a painter, enunciated a common theme