Floating Worlds and Future Cities: The Genius of Lazar Khidekel, Suprematism, and the Russian Avant-Garde
Exhibit Venue:
YIVO Institute at the Center for Jewish History15 West 16th Street
New York, NY
Exhibit Date:
April 21 - August 5, 2013
The Lazar Khidekel Society and RACC hope that you have been able to visit the exhibition, "Floating Worlds and Future Cities: The Genius of Lazar Khidekel, Suprematism, and the Russian Avant-Garde" at the YIVO Institute.
For those of you who did not have a chance to see the exhibition, or wish to revisit the exhibition, the closing date for Floating Worlds has been extended from July 30 to August 5, 2013.
The three-month run of the exhibition was an exciting time, and a very special experience. The exhibition’s opening and symposium brought a fascinating crowd of museum curators, artists, architects, collectors, art lovers and specialists, press and general public. The distinguished panelists explored Lazar Khidekel’s art and design from different perspectives, contributing their papers to the development of the corpus of studies in the realm of Russian Avant-garde.
The exhibition was widely attended by different groups and personalities who wrote rave and enthusiastic responses. There was a good press response, and professional reviews appeared in local and international publications.
We are looking forward to Lazar Khidekel’s upcoming shows in London, San-Francisco, Moscow, and Washington.
Hurry to see the show before the closing date!
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“Floating Worlds and Future Cities" will present the comprehensive exhibition in the United States of the work of the great Russian Avant-garde artist, architect, designer and theoretician, Lazar Khidekel (1904-1986).
Lazar Khidekel worked closely with Marc Chagall, El Lissitzky and Kazimir Malevich in Vitbesk in the years 1918-1922, where he became an important proponent and theoretician of the avant-garde movement known as Suprematism and a founding member of the UNOVIS group (Affirmers of New Art), which included other notable Russian and Jewish artists such as Kazimir Malevich, El Lissitsky, Nina Kogan and Ilya Chashnik. This exhibition and accompanying symposium and catalog will explore Khidekel’s biography and work, the Jewish contribution to the Russian avant-garde, the glory of Vitebsk (“the Paris of the East,” as it was known during this period), and focus on Lazar Khidekel's role in the transition of Suprematism from painting to architecture, cosmic urbanization, and radical yet environmentally conscious city planning of the future.
Curated by Dr. Regina Khidekel, the exhibition will include paintings, drawings, period photographs, UNOVIS documents, publications and letters drawn from the Khidekel Family Archive, as well as architectural models.
Works of Lazar Khidekel were shown in the U.S., Europe and Russia, including solo exhibitions in Magnes Museum in Berkeley, 2004, and in Haus Konstruktiv and The Leuenhof, Zurich, 2010-2012. Lazar Khidekel’s manifesto “AERO. Articles and Projects”, Vitebsk, 1920, has been included in the “Timeline” of the Haus Konstruktiv's “COMPLETE CONCRETE” exhibition on the 100 years of development of constructivist, concrete and conceptual art and its effect on the present.
About the Symposium | Speakers:
Dr. Jonathan Brent, Executive Director, YIVO Institute Opening remarks
Dr. Maria Kokkori, Research Fellow, The Art Institute of Chicago Khidekel and Malevich’s teaching philosophy and Vitebsk art school.
Ginés Garrido, Architect PhD, Graduate School of Design, Harvard University Fellow The Dream of Flight. On the gravity-defying nature of a new Landscape Infrastructure.
Dr. Regina Khidekel, President, Lazar Khidekel Society Malevich, Khidekel and Vitebsk: Jewish Connections
Professor Bengamin Harshav, Yale University, Chagall, Lissitzky and Khidekel
Professor Constantine Boym, Designer From the Spoon to the City
Dr. Mark Khidekel, Architect The development of Russian Avant-garde Ecological themes to solve Architectural challenges of the 21st century postindustrial civilization.
ABOUT YIVO: Founded in 1925, the YIVO Institute is headquartered in New York City, and is the world’s premier teaching and research institute devoted to East European Jewish Studies with specializations in the Yiddish language, literature, and folklore; the Holocaust and the American Jewish experience. www.yivo.org
ABOUT LAZAR KHIDEKEL SOCIETY: Founded by the family of Lazar Khidekel and a group of distinguished art historians, museum specialists, and art supporters under the auspices of the RACC in New York, the Lazar Khidekel Society aims to sustain and preserve Lazar Khidekel's legacy in art, architecture, and design, and to advance through research, publications and exhibitions, the recognition of Lazar Khidekel (1904, Vitebsk – 1986, Leningrad), as one of the titans of the Russian Avant-garde, particularly the Suprematist movement, that laid the foundation for art and architecture of the 20th and 21st centuries.
More about Lazar Khidekel’s works: www.lazarkhidekel.com
More about YIVO Institute: www.yivoinstitute.org
Lazar Khidekel Society: http://russianamericanculture.com/Mission.php Contact the Lazar Khidekel Society at: russculture@aol.com or 646-831-0554
Sunday, April 21, 2013 - Symposium, exhibition opening & reception
3:00pm Symposium | 5:00pm Exhibition Opening & Reception
Exhibition Opening & Reception Exhibition on view through June 30
Floating Worlds and Future Cities: The Genius of Lazar Khidekel, Suprematism and the Russian Avant-Garde. Catalog in conjunction with the exhibition at YIVO, NY. Lazar Khidekel Society, NY, 2013
Regina Khidekel, editor and chronology
Maria Kokkori and Alexander Bouras, The Suprematist line: Kazimir Malevich and Lazar Khidekel
Gines Garrido, Anti-Gravity Urban Visions for a New World
Roman Khidekel, From Visionary to Reality
Arquitectura Viva article (in Spanish)
EVENT LISTINGS and PRESS
Article Discovering Khidekel | WAI Architecture Think Tank Archinect.com
http://rbth.ru/culture_calendar/2013/03/26/lazar_khidekel_exhibition_in_new_york_worldjew4295.html
http://archinect.com/news/article/53722256/discovering-khidekel
http://blog.gmane.org/gmane.culture.studies.history.slavic/month=20130401
http://www.bustler.net/index.php/event/floating_worlds_and_future_citieslazar_khidekel_suprematism/
http://internationalpsychoanalysis.net/2013/04/14/this-week-at-yivo/
Between Sky and Earth by Regina Khidekel ( Russian & English)
http://elegantnewyork.com/trajectory-of-suprematism
http://www.materialworldblog.com/about-us/
http://kharshak.livejournal.com/117943.html (Proector #2, Sankt Peterburg)
Exhibition catalog sponsored by the Lazar Khidekel Society
