Suprematism

also: супрематизм

movement c. 1913-1925 Russia Europe

Suprematism is an early-20th-century abstract movement founded by Kazimir Malevich, built from the simplest geometric forms - squares, circles, crosses - in a limited palette, floating in open space. Its name claims "the supremacy of pure artistic feeling" over any depiction of the visible world. Malevich credited the birth of the idea to the sets and costumes he designed for the Futurist opera Victory over the Sun (1913), and announced the movement at the Last Futurist Exhibition 0.10 in Petrograd in 1915, hanging his Black Square in the traditional icon corner. Through the Supremus group, the Vitebsk school UNOVIS, and El Lissitzky's Proun constructions, it spread into typography, design, and architecture. Fundamentally anti-materialist and opposed to Constructivism, Suprematism was crushed when Socialist Realism became state doctrine in 1934.

Lead image of the Wikipedia article "Suprematism".
Lead image of the Wikipedia article "Suprematism".Public domain (credit: Kazimir Malevich) · source

Defining characteristics

  • Elemental geometry: squares, circles, and crosses as the whole visual vocabulary
  • Open, empty space in which forms float without ground line or horizon
  • Flat, unmodulated color in a limited range, laid down without visible brushwork
  • Diagonal and off-axis placement producing dynamic tension and weightlessness
  • No figure, narrative, or reference to the visible world - pure non-objectivity
  • Composition tuned for emotional effect: asymmetry balanced as pure feeling

Key figures

  • Kazimir Malevich (1879-1935) — Founder and theorist; painted Black Square and wrote The Non-Objective World
  • Olga Rozanova (1886-1918) — Key Supremus painter and essayist on Cubism, Futurism, and Suprematism
  • Liubov Popova (1889-1924) — Painter in the Supremus circle who later moved toward Constructivism
  • El Lissitzky (1890-1941) — Carried Suprematism West through his Prouns; bridge to De Stijl and the Bauhaus
  • Lazar Khidekel (1904-1986) — Suprematist architect; created the first Suprematist architectural project (1926)

Example works

Sources

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