Constructivism in the Automobile Showrooms of Warsaw. The Blok Artists Against Motorisation and the Problems of Worker Culture (1924–1925)
Przemysław Strożek
przemyslaw.strozek@ispan.plInstitute of Art, Polish Academy of Sciences (Poland)
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6473-7894
Abstract
The exhibitions: by Henryk Berlewi held at the Austro-Daimler automobile showroom and by the Blok group at the Laurin & Klement automobile showroom were the first manifestations of Constructivism in Warsaw. Both exhibitions opened in March 1924 and glorified the unrivalled achievement of collective labour organisation that was the automobile. This article examines the significance of artistic endeavours of the Warsaw Constructivists in the face of the issues related to car construction and production in a local and international context. Their early postulates and experiments were oriented more towards issues of machine production than towards the radical social transformations and revolutionary aspirations of the struggling proletariat. Their view of creativity as based on a rational division of labour indicates that there existed an inconsistency within the Blok group in the perception of the role of an artist as both a creator/engineer and a producer/worker. The conclusions of the analysis show the history of the Blok group as moving from the rationalisation and methodical organisation of work to the issues of establishing a space for the results of this work.
Keywords:
Blok of Cubists, Suprematists and Constructivists, “Blok. Czasopismo awangardy artystycznej”, exhibitions, Constructivism, avant-garde, automobilism, Purism, architectureReferences
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Authors
Przemysław Strożekprzemyslaw.strozek@ispan.pl
Institute of Art, Polish Academy of Sciences Poland
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6473-7894
Przemysław Strożek PhD (habil.) is a research fellow at the Institute of Art of the Polish Academy of Sciences and a curator at the Archiv der Avantgarden in Dresden. He is the author of many exhibitions, books and academic texts on the history of the avant-garde, an editor of the “Journal of Avant-Garde Studies” (Brill) and the author of the book Picturing the Workers’ Olympics and the Spartakiads. Modernist and AvantGarde Engagement with Sport in Central Europe and the USSR (Routledge, 2022). He was the co-curator (together with Sara Lagnaoui) of the exhibition Ahmed Cherkaoui in Warsaw. PolishMoroccan artistic relations, 1955–1980 presented at the Zachęta National Gallery of Art (2020).
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