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1

UNFAMILIAR POINTS. JOSEF SIMA, RICHARD WEINER AND THE GROUP 'LE GRAND JEU'

100%

Srp K.

Umění (Art)

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2004

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vol. 52

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issue 1

11-36

EN

One of the most productive artistic encounters between Czech modern artists and the emerging French avant-garde took place in the second half of the 1920s within the group 'Le Grand Jeu'. Members of the group were in close contact with the much older poet and journalist Richard Weiner, a long-time resident of Paris, and with the painter Josef Sima, who also lived in Paris from the beginning of the 1920s on. Sima came to be one of the key members of 'Le Grand Jeu', as well as one of its most important artists, at the centre of the group's journalistic and exhibition activities. There was a great similarity, in terms of outlook and theme, between the poetic and thematic work of René Daumal and Roger Gilbert-Lecomte on the one hand and Richard Weiner on the other. They inspired one another and made a similar critique of rationalist civilisation, to which each of them brought his own experience and point of view to bear. They were particularly interested in the concept of paradise and criticised the simplified interpretation of the cognitive process as cerebral analytical judgement. Such judgement cut the contemporary individual off from contact with wholeness, miracles and grace, central concepts that 'Le Grand Jeu' tried to revive. In the extensive poetics, entitled The Barber-surgeon, which Weiner developed at the same time as the manifestos and other declarations of 'Le Grand Jeu', the contemporary individual, robbed of paradise, was distinguished from the surviving non-European cultures of primitive peoples. The latter were still living in paradise and the world of miracles, but were, paradoxically, unaware of these. After 1927, Sima became the main representative of these views in the visual arts. Contact with the representatives of 'Le Grand Jeu' opened up for him a 'second' sight, distinct from the purely sensuous sight that he had devoted himself to completely until then. Paintings such as 'Lightning', 'Double Landscape' and 'Meridian' in particular constitute key visualisations of the poetic and programmatic principles of 'Le Grand Jeu'. Although it resisted discursive approaches, in the end the group was compelled to turn to them in order to make its own programme comprehensible.

2

AVANT-GARDE ART DISPLAY RECREATIONS HISTORISED: MUZEUM SZTUKI IN ŁÓDŹ AS A REFERENTIAL CASE?

75%

Lorente J. P.

Muzeológia a kultúrne dedičstvo

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2021

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vol. 9

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issue 3

5 – 15

EN

Museums can no longer pretend to be mere containers of art or other cultural treasures; their fascinating legacy for posterity is definitely not just the respective collection, but also its idiosyncratic articulation and ulterior resignification. This essay surveys sifting trends in the re-staging of modern museographies; but instead of using New York’s MoMA as the obvious paradigm, pride of place is given here to the Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź (Poland). Its original Neoplastic Hall survived only from June 1948 until October 1950; but it was reconstructed ten years later, prefiguring other museographical remakes of avant-garde art displays. Thereafter, it also became, in many ways, a typical example characterising postmodern museological trends. All in all, it could perhaps be discussed nowadays in the light of critical museology as a referential case in the history of heritagised museographies.

3

Latviešu kreisās mākslas uzliesmojumi 20. gs. 20.–30. gados Latvijā un Padomju Krievijā

63%

Kāle S.

Makslas Vesture un Teorija

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2021

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vol. 25

39-54

EN

In the interwar period, the consistently developed output of leftist artists proved unacceptable and dangerous to both Soviet Russia’s and Latvia’s political elites and civic circles. This is largely evident from the previous research on this subject that has encountered numerous obstacles. Among these was either partial or complete annihilation of artists and their art during the Great Terror in Russia, the dogmatic perspective of Socialist Realism focused on meticulously realist form, direct Communist ideological connotations affecting leftist art as well as the traumatic historical experiences of Latvia and Latvians under the Soviet occupation and waves of repressions. The article is a pioneering look at the most radical leftist Latvian artists’ activities in Soviet Russia and Latvia, searching for their common denominators. In 1922 and 1923, the artist Kārlis Johansons (1890–1929) who was known in Russian avant-garde circles wanted to organise two exhibitions in Latvia with himself as well as Gustavs Klucis (1895–1938) and Aleksandrs Drēviņš (1889–1938) as participants but met with a lack of interest. Klucis and Johansons later took part in the leftist Latvian group Kref that was active from 18 November 1923 to spring 1924, uniting fine artists and writers. In Latvia, the tandem of writer Linards Laicens (1883–1938) and artist Ernests Kālis (1904–1939) took over the popularisation of leftist art in the second half of the 1920s. They were active for some time before the onset of the Great Depression paying attention to constructivist form alongside socially critical ideas. The brightest example of their cooperation was the revolutionary literary magazine of Latvian workers Kreisā Fronte published in Riga from March 1928 to December 1930 when it was closed. Leftist Latvian authors had episodic contacts via the cultural and educational society Prometejs (1924–1937). At first, the society was active in publishing Latvian books and periodicals at its publishing house Prometejs but in the early 1930s it also oversaw the Latvian section of the International Bureau of Revolutionary Artists (IBRA). Kālis as well as Samuils Haskins (1909–1974), emigrated to Soviet Russia in the mid-1930s but, instead of Soviet benefits, both encountered the directives of Socialist Realism and were arrested in 1937 and 1938 as Latvian spies. Although, unlike Drēviņš and Klucis, they escaped death during the Great Terror, they experienced confinement or exclusion from culture as “wrong” leftists, threatening or too alien to the established artistic life or political system.

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1 Srp K.

UNFAMILIAR POINTS. JOSEF SIMA, RICHARD WEINER AND THE GROUP 'LE GRAND JEU'

AVANT-GARDE ART DISPLAY RECREATIONS HISTORISED: MUZEUM SZTUKI IN ŁÓDŹ AS A REFERENTIAL CASE?

Latviešu kreisās mākslas uzliesmojumi 20. gs. 20.–30. gados Latvijā un Padomju Krievijā